


Part IV: I, Negan

by jenlcb



Series: Delayed Gratification [4]
Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation, The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-07
Updated: 2017-02-02
Packaged: 2018-09-15 10:26:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 46,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9230804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenlcb/pseuds/jenlcb
Summary: Negan is raising an unruly but adorable 4 year old girl in his pre-Sanctuary Sanctuary when the pretty Dr. O'Reilly arrives to save the dying orphans under his care. Will they fall in love or murder one another? And how many times will they almost consummate their confusing relationship? And what about Data?Part IV is dedicated to alreynolds13, whose work "Irresistible Danger" is a must-read for Negan fans.





	1. Month 1: World Turned Upside Down

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alreynolds13](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alreynolds13/gifts).



Lieutenant Commander Data had managed to regain some navigational control of the freefalling shuttlecraft, landing some two hundred miles from its destination. A pretty remarkable feat, even for an android.

The landing had not been smooth, however, and after automatically shutting down and rebooting three times, Data was conscious enough to perform a manual systems check. He found that all functions appeared to be operating under normal parameters.

Data checked the medical crew for signs of life. He found Dr. T’Mollek O’Reilly, the leader of this medical away team mission, to be unconscious but alive. She was covered in the red blood of her colleagues as well as her own green blood. Data was also rather blood spattered, although he himself appeared to be physically unharmed.

He attempted to hail the _Enterprise_ using the shuttlecraft’s communications system but received no answer. He tapped the communicator badge on his chest, but there was no response. He tapped the badges of the rest of the away team—nothing.

He moved back to the cargo bay to assess the damage to the solar panels (minimal), to the bottled water (moderate), and the medical supplies (extensive). He salvaged several water bottles, whatever medical supplies he could find, and a tricorder, placing them in a bag, which he slung across his chest. Then he picked up Dr. O’Reilly, carried her out of the shuttle craft, and set off south toward the camp using the stars for navigation.

***

T’Mollek was a little girl and she was being carried by her father. She couldn’t see his face, but she knew he was her father because she felt protected. She had been sleeping and woke up crying with a fever. He had come to her room to carry her into her mother’s bed.

Her mother’s long, chestnut hair was pulled back in a loose side braid. She sat up to make room for her daughter. Her mother’s pointed ears and ridged forehead were comforting to her. Her father’s rounded ears and smooth forehead made him look like everyone else they lived among on Earth, and seeing her own face reflected in her mother’s beautiful one made her feel like she belonged to something.

She tried to go back to sleep but the bed was jostled. She opened her eyes to ask her mother why the bed was shaking.

She blinked in the early morning sunshine and looked around, trying to clear her brain and recall what had happened. This hurt and her every instinct told her to close her eyes and go back to sleep. But she recognized a concussion when she felt one, and she took a deep breath, trying to remain awake.

It came back to her.

She had been given her first leadership role on an away mission to the Algalon. The planet had been established as a penal colony two centuries ago by the neighboring planets of Betagon and Calagon. The colony had been attacked two years prior by Romulans, who had killed or captured everyone but a dozen children and the president of the planet, Jaxon Traegar.

Her heart rate increased and she felt the desire to run. There was something about Jaxon Traegar that wasn’t right. What was it? She couldn’t remember.

T’Mollek felt a pang of embarrassment at that. She had always been a failure. Had Captain Picard really made her the leader of this mission? Hadn’t she nearly flunked out of Starfleet? She had been a low-level pediatrician on a starbase for eleven years. She was an introvert. What was she doing leading an away team for the flagship of Starfleet?

She couldn’t remember how or why that decision had been made, but she intended to carry out her command. Even though she was a lieutenant junior grade, and the android was a lieutenant commander, he took orders from her now.

She tried to speak through a dry throat. “Status— _ahem—_ status report, Mr. Data?” she asked from his inhumanly strong arms. He was carrying her like a rolled up carpet.

“The shuttle craft sustained considerable damage,” he answered impassively, not breaking his stride nor losing a single breath. “According to your tricorder, you sustained a concussion and multiple contusions, mainly on your head, face, and upper body. Bechdel, Wallace, and Richards are deceased. My system went briefly offline but my self-diagnostic programming does not detect any lasting damage.”

“The tricorders are functional?”

“Only yours. I have brought it with us along with a medical kit and several bottles of water.”

“Excellent,” she said, then after a moment of being carried, she added, “Er, Mr. Data. I can walk.”

“Your tricorder indicated that you should remain as immobile as possible for the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours,” Data informed her.

T’Mollek sighed. There was no use arguing with him. “Very well.”

They walked for another twenty minutes like this. Then in the distance, a dusty teal pickup truck barreled down the hill toward them. T’Mollek tried to sit up in Data’s arms. She recognized Jaxon’s truck from the compound. She remembered why she had been sent on this mission—although she still didn’t understand why she had been put in command. The six children remaining on the planet had Tarsen’s disease. The virus was resistant to treatment, and the children were in quarantine. Due to her Vulcan genetics, she was immune to Tarsen’s, so she would be administering the testing and the treatment.

And now, with her entire medical crew dead, she would be researching and formulating the treatment as well and caring for the orphans completely on her own until the _Enterprise_ returned in ninety days to take the children to Betagon to be adopted.

But why had the thought of President Traegar triggered her fight or flight instinct?

“Mr. Data,” she said urgently. “Put me down.”

“As I stated before, the tricorder indicated that would not be the best medical course of ac—”

“That’s an order,” she snapped.

“Yes, Commander,” he said, immediately setting her down.

She stood on shaky legs, and he steadied her by placing his hands on her shoulders and bracing her back with his body. She was surprised to feel that his body was warm. She leaned against him until the truck approached. Jaxon Traegar and a late-middle-aged Berellian man jumped out of the truck and ran toward her. She took a small step forward, away from Data.

“Do not let me fall,” she said quietly to him.

Jaxon Traegar stood at 6’2”, about three inches taller than Data and a full foot taller than T’Mollek. The definition of tall, dark, and handsome, Traegar also had a ruggedness that was extremely disarming. His hair was dark, short, and tousled, and he had a trimmed salt-and-pepper beard. His eyes were light brown and smoldering. Each cheek bore a deep dimple even when his face was in repose.

She found him repugnant.

The Berellian was a tall and lanky humanoid, white-haired, with warm, kindly eyes.

T’Mollek liked him immediately.

“My god, are you all right?” Traegar exclaimed as he approached them.

“We saw the smoke and the flames in the sky,” added the Berellian. “What happened?”

T’Mollek waited for Data to answer but then remembered she was the leader of this team. “Our shuttle craft was attacked by what appeared to be a Romulan vessel.”

“The rest of your crew . . .?” the Berellian inquired. Traegar was silent, his eyes fixed on the injured doctor.

“They are all dead,” Data said, extending his hand at the same time. “We have not met. I am Lieutenant Commander Data.”

Slightly bemused, the Berellian took his hand. “I'm . . . Chief Del of the U.S.S. _Infinity_ ,” he said. “This is Jaxon Traegar, the president of . . . well, of the planet. Such as it is.”

Traegar smiled a humble smile that accentuated his dimples. “A pleasure,” he said, shaking their hands.

“It's strange,” said Del. “My shuttle was also fired upon by Romulans when I arrived a year ago, just before the end of the war. We thought they'd left this sector when the fighting stopped.”

“It would seem they have returned,” said Traegar grimly, his eyes still on T’Mollek.

“Or perhaps they were lying in wait,” T’Mollek said, holding his gaze, albeit uncomfortably.

“I’unno,” he returned with a lazy drawl. “They would’ve had no way of knowin’ you were comin’. For all they know, everyone on this planet is dead or evacuated. No life signs.”

She felt the deep rumble of his voice in her chest. It was like listening to a talking lion.

“The ionic fluctuations,” T’Mollek said. It was all starting to come back to her. “They block scanners and prevent molecular transport.”

“Yes,” said Del. “They’ve been affecting the planet since before Dr. Hall and I arrived.” He looked down at the ground.

“Apparently the Romulans believe there is still something of value here,” Data said.

“We really should bury the dead and bring the supplies back to camp,” T’Mollek said quietly, her eyes unable to escape Traegar’s gaze. What was it about him that both drew and repelled her?

“Del and I'll handle that,” Traegar said. “You've have a hard trip. You're injured. We’ll drive you back to the compound. You can get cleaned up and rest a little. We'll come back and get . . . everything.”

“I am not in need of rest,” Data said. “I will assist you.”

“Well, yeah, that would make things go faster, wouldn't it?” Traegar said softly, side-eyeing the android.

“Neither am I in need of rest,” T’Mollek said with strength she didn’t particularly feel. “However, if you have no objections, I would like to begin examining the children. Data? My tricorder?”

“Well, there’ll be plenty of time for that tomorrow,” said Traegar. “You should clean up first and get some sleep. Do that Vulcan self-healing thing.”

That practice was not common knowledge, and T’Mollek wondered how he knew about it.

Data decided to fill in the awkward silence as he handed her the tricorder and portable scanner from his pack. “Dr. O'Reilly is only one quarter Vulcan. Her training was limited in time and scope, so she is not as proficient in all the skills unique to natives of that planet. For example, a recent attempt at the nerve pinch proved painfully unsuccessf—”

“ _Thank_ you, Data,” she said, quietly but sharply.

Data cocked his head and narrowed his eyes, ever so slightly. He had noticed that he was often interrupted when he was trying to be helpful. The emotion chip that he had briefly had installed had not allowed him to delve into the reasons for that. “You are welcome.”

Traegar chuckled charmingly. “Well, I'm sure she has lots of other skills that’ll come in very useful here,” he said, causing T’Mollek to blush. “But not tonight! Tonight is for rest and relaxation.”

“And mourning the dead,” T’Mollek said quietly but politely.

He grinned, slightly abashed, and extended his hand in a silent invitation to walk with him toward the truck. That was when she saw the skull charm hanging from his bracelet. The memory of who he actually was made her stagger as she took her first step, and she gasped.

“Negan,” she breathed.

He turned sharply to her but didn’t help steady her. “What’s that you said?” His voice came out a low rumble.

She took another unsteady step, as though limping. “My knee again,” she whispered. “I twisted it in the crash.”

“You poor thing!” Del said paternally, coming to her aid. Traegar waved him off and put his own strong arm around her, gripping her shoulder with the hand bearing the skull charm on his wrist.

At his touch, T’Mollek flinched inwardly. Her stomach tightened.

Traegar helped T’Mollek into the truck and drove her back to the compound while Del and Data stayed back preparing the bodies and supplies for later transport. When they reached her tent, Traegar handed her a small piece of metal.

“What’s this?”

“It’s a key to your tent.”

“Do I need a key?”

“I thought you might like some semblance of security. But I mean, it’s not like I’m gonna break in and demand half of your stuff.” He flashed a white, toothy grin. She stared at him. “I’m kidding!”

“Thank you,” she said, taking the key. “Is there one to the hospital as well?”

“Yeah,” he said with a cocky grin. “That, you’ll get tomorrow. For now? Rest.”

She got out of the truck, used the key to unlock her tent door, and went inside, closing the door behind her. She watched out the window as Traegar— _Negan—_ drove away _._

Once he was out of sight, she left the tent and made her way to the hospital. She tried the door and was surprised to find it unlocked. Negan had implied that the hospital was locked and that she wouldn’t have access.

She was tired of people telling her what was best for her as if they knew her better than she knew herself.

This brought back another memory—why she had been placed in charge of this mission even though she was grossly underqualified. She had had a year-long on-again, off-again relationship (if one could call it that) with an omniscient godlike being known as Q. A member of the “Q Continuum,” Q was an arrogant and disruptive menace who had caused mischief all over the universe for millennia.

And he had taken a shine to T’Mollek.

_“A shine to”? Where did that phrase come from?_

Q had taken it upon himself to push T’Mollek into the spotlight at every opportunity he could—to what end, she had no idea. But according to the entire crew of the _Enterprise_ , who had encountered him numerous times, his motives were most likely dark and dangerous. Nobody trusted him—and as a result of her relationship with him, the ship’s second officer, William T. Riker, did not trust her. He had fought Captain Picard’s decision to give her command of this mission—rightly so, T’Mollek knew—and it had almost cost T’Mollek a place on the mission altogether.

That would have been disastrous for T’Mollek—for some reason she couldn’t quite put her finger on. She had a deeper mission here—beyond saving the children. It was deadly important.

She hoped it would come back to her soon.

She entered the hospital where she found six children languishing in hospital beds, connected to IVs, feverish, lethargic and covered with dark purple hives that faded in an out across their faces and bodies.

The disease was in the end stages.

She spoke to each of them, introducing herself and vowing to help them. She scanned each of them in turn with her tricorder but could detect no trace of virus, bacterium, poison, or any other anomaly. This was unsurprising, as the Tarsen’s virus was not generally detectable by simple tricorder scan. Then she went outside to analyze the plant life, the soil, the well water, nearby insects, the farm animals. She scanned everything she encountered.

She grew exhausted by all this effort and realized she had left her water bottles in Negan’s truck. She drew some water from the well outside the hospital, drank from her hands, and soaked a towel with it to clean her wound.

Feeling somewhat better, she went back inside and took some blood and fluid samples from the children. She took them to the laboratory at the front of the building facing the double doors leading outside. The space appeared to have once been the school’s administrative offices. She placed the samples on the portable scanner and connected it to her tricorder. This deep scan would indicate the exact strain of Tarsen’s virus the children suffered from, and she hoped the medications that had survived the crash would be sufficient to cure it.

As the scanner worked on analyzing the samples, she walked around the building. School art still hung on the walls in the hallway. Several of the classrooms were empty, but a few contained books and other school supplies. When she reached the end of the hallway, she found a stairway leading to the second floor. She climbed it—slowly—and when she reached the top of the stairs, she found that the doorway had been demolished in the raid. The rubble covered the floor—brick, mortar, dust, and twisted metal.

T’Mollek’s head started to pound and her heart raced. The room spun. Through the sound of her gasping for breath, she didn’t hear the main door of the building swing open.

***

“Doctor? Doctor!”

His deep voice cut through the haze of fear and disarray. It jarred her, awakened her.

_Fight or flight?_

“Dr. O’Reilly, c’mon,” the man she knew as Negan said with a grin as he met her halfway up the stairwell. Del was waiting at the bottom. “I know it’s tempting to jump in with both feet, but you just got here. They’re not gonna get any worse by tomorrow, I promise.”

“I just wanted to run some analyses . . .” she mumbled, following him down the stairs.

“I know, I know,” he said, his hands in the air in mock supplication. “That’s fine. Here’s your tricorder. Did it tell you anything?”

She reached the bottom of the stairs and took the tricorder from him. “I had just set up a deep analysis. It will take several hours to complete.” Irritated, she started to walk past him to reattach the scanner.

“It can wait,” he said firmly, reaching out and gripping her arm. “Look. It’s past lunchtime and I’ll bet you haven’t eaten anything since yesterday. Plus, and pardon my brutal honesty, you look shitty.”

“Jaxon!” Del protested softly in her defense. She was a lady, and one simply did not speak to a lady like that.

“Sorry!” Negan grinned. “You’re gonna wanna . . . freshen up. There’s no running water, and what’s in the well smells a little iffy, but it’s safe—I’m sure you know that from your scans. Actually, it's a warm day and there’s a real nice beach just south of here, down the hill. Have a swim. It’ll make you feel like a new woman. You can do more scans there—the sea water, the marine life. . . .”

“I do not wish to 'have a swim,'” she protested.

“I'm afraid it will do you no good to argue, Doctor,” Del said with an accommodating smile.

She sighed. She could use a bite to eat and an analgesic. Her head was still pounding. “Very well. Give me ten minutes to set the scanner up. Again. Then I will . . . ‘freshen up’ and ‘have a swim.’”

“If you insist,” Negan said. “You can see yourself out. The door’ll lock behind you. You can keep an eye on the quarantine room with this monitor.” He removed a small device from his pocket and handed it to her. The device had a small screen that showed the inside of the quarantine room. He casually put his left hand beneath hers to steady the device in her hand as he pressed a button below the screen with his right index finger. It changed the angle of the view.

“Thank you,” T’Mollek said, pulling her hands away from his.

Negan and Del left the building. T’Mollek returned to the lab to set up the tricorder and scanner to run a full analysis. This one would take nearly half the day to run. It would be just about ready following dinner that evening. She would wait until the end of the meal and ask “Traegar” for the key to the hospital.

She left the building, and as she heard the door latch closed behind her, her stomach churned and she vomited into a potted plant.

***

T’Mollek returned to her tent to rest and attempt self-healing. She had managed to nearly place herself in a sufficiently deep state of meditation when she heard the sound of a small child screaming. She was surprised by the strength of the scream. The young patients had not seemed capable of producing such sounds.

She ran out of her tent and heard the scream again. It was not coming from the hospital across the road but from the other side of the row of tents. She turned around and ran down the hill toward the beach half a mile south of the compound.

Surrounding the beach were rocky cliffs and caves. Near the edge of the cliffs stood a massive tree that offered shade to one side of the rocky beach. It took T’Mollek some time to safely reach the sand on the other side. When she arrived, she saw a little girl, about three or four years of age, with long, thick, tangled black hair. She was running toward the waves and screaming as they splashed her, then running away from them.

T’Mollek felt foolish. She was an expert at child development and could not tell the difference between a scream of delight and a scream of distress.

In her own defense, she had not been told that any of the children on Algalon were healthy enough for frolic.

She decided to introduce herself.  
  
“Hello!” she called. “My name is Doct—”

The little girl froze, then ran away into the caves. T’Mollek followed but soon lost sight of her.

Who was this feral child? Were Negan and Del aware of her existence? How had she avoided illness?

T’Mollek felt another wave of nausea and nearly vomited again. Her vision became cloudy with a gray aura and she took a moment to steady herself.

_I am hallucinating._

She returned to her tent to once again attempt self-healing.


	2. My Dinner with Negan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan and T'Mollek size one another up over dinner.

That evening at the appointed time, T’Mollek exited her tent, cleaner and clearer-headed than she had been in the past twenty-four hours. Instead of heading next door to Negan’s house, she walked across the road to the hospital. She looked through the double doors and saw her tricorder on the front desk of the laboratory, lights flashing to indicate the full scan was complete and the results were ready. Between the angle of the screen and the distance from the door, however, she was unable to read them. On a whim she tried the door, but it was locked. She quietly but firmly placed a fist on the door in annoyance.

She turned and walked back across the road to Negan’s house.

She knocked on the door and she heard a loud creaking from the other side. The door opened and Negan greeted her. He wore a short-sleeved white T-shirt that stretched tight across his broad chest. His dark biceps bulged from underneath the sleeves. Del was there already. Negan looked down at the sand T’Mollek had tracked onto the floor.

“I see you found some time to visit the beach,” he drawled with an air of satisfaction.

“I apologize,” she said haltingly. “I thought I had cleaned my boots thoroughly.”

“Naw, don’t worry about,” he said kindly. “C’mon in and make yourself comfortable. I’d offer you a cocktail, but the best I can do is bottled water. It's a bit of a step up from the well water, more filtered, a little less. . . 'earthy.' The children don’t mind it, though. The ones who can still drink, I mean. Here.”

He handed her a bottle.

“Thank you,” she said, taking a polite sip.

“I thought Data might join us, but he wanted to get started working on the shuttlecraft repairs.”

“Of course,” T’Mollek said with mild sarcasm. “ _He_ has important work that can’t wait until morning.”

Negan’s mouth twitched slightly. “I know you’re anxious to help those children. But I promise you, one more night will not make any difference. They’re all doing just fine right now. Resting very comfortably.”

“Where is Dr. Hall?” she asked, looking around. “I wanted to ask her about the flora on this planet. My tricorder did not clearly indicate Tarsen’s disease during my initial scan, and I wish to discuss other possib—”

“Dr. Hall passed away,” Negan said stiffly.

T’Mollek was stunned. “She—er—”

“Several weeks ago. Of Tarsen’s.”

“You’re certain it was Tarsen’s?”

“She had the black rash, the fever, and then the . . . vomiting. Of blood,” he said, his voice breaking in sorrow. He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand.

“Why did you not tell us this during meeting yester—?”

“Dinner is served!” called Del cheerily from the kitchen, wearing an apron and holding a platter.

Negan placed a hand on the back of T’Mollek’s shoulder and led her into the small eat-in kitchen.

“I must apologize, Doctor,” Del said, setting the platter of sliced ham on the table. “I’ve been planning this meal all week. Until I met you this afternoon, I didn’t realize you were a Vulcan. Your name . . . threw me!”

He glanced at Negan with the unspoken question, _Why didn’t you tell me this before_? but then anxiously looked back to T’Mollek. “We do have plenty of vegetarian options here, of course, even for sources of protein. Beans, uh . . . There may be nut trees in the forest, among the fruit trees.”

“You grew up on a farm, didn’t you?” Negan asked, smiling charmingly. She looked at him in surprise, and he hastily explained, “I read that in your file.”

She relaxed. She couldn’t remember why, but she had wanted him to read her file. “Yes, I did.”

“And you raised . . . pigs, I think I read?”

“We did,” she said, glancing nostalgically at the plate of ham on the table. “And chickens.”

“I hope it’s all right that we’re serving meat,” Negan said. “I wasn’t sure if you followed the Vulcan practice of vegetarianism, or not.”

“Many humans are also vegetarians,” she pointed out. “And most humans utilize replicators. Butchering animals for meat is not generally considered socially acceptable behavior.”

“Yes, I realize that,” Negan said mildly, picking up the platter. “Ham?”

“No, thank you.” She eyed the plate longingly. It had been nearly twenty-five years since she had smelled fresh ham and it brought back a mixture of emotions—both wonderful and devastating. But she couldn’t quite place the specific reasons. She filled her plate with garden salad.

“Suit yourself,” Negan said lightly. “Looks great, Del.”

“Well, it’s certainly fresh, although it was a challenge to butcher!” Del said jovially.

“You did very well for your first attempt,” Negan said. “Is your wound healing?”

“Yes, it is!” His laugh sounded slightly forced as held up his bandaged hand.

“Somebody has to do it,” Negan said. “I don’t have the stomach for killing. Never have.”

“Then we have that in common,” T’Mollek said with an arch of her eyebrow and the flicker of a smile. She took a bite of salad.

The memory of Negan holding a knife on her flashed in her mind. She took another bite.

“Dinner roll?” Negan asked, holding a basket to her.

The skull charm hung from his wrist and she remembered the luchador named Specter who had been known for his penchant for pulling knives on his opponents in the wrestling ring. It was widely assumed to be stage theatrics, but when he stabbed a Cardassian opponent to death in the ring, his wrestling career was over. He went into politics and then became embroiled in a scandal when he went into business with a scientist who spread a deadly plague on Vulcan under the guise of curing an incurable disease.

How he had ended up on Algalon under the assumed name Jaxon Traegar was a mystery to her. But now she remembered who he was and why she was really here.

Negan cleared his throat. “Dinner roll?” he asked again, more loudly. “Hello? Algalon to T’Mollek. Come in, T’Mollek.”

Del chuckled uncomfortably.

T’Mollek reached for a roll with her hand, but she stopped herself. She took the basket from his hand and passed it on to Del.

Negan watched her all the while. He knew a Vulcan would never eat with her hands or eat meat. T’Mollek was keeping true to her native planet’s customs, but they didn’t seem to come naturally to her. He had read her personnel file and knew that she had lived only four years there, intensively studying with Ambassador T’Sharr, and that she had nearly failed out of Starfleet Academy.

Her training did not appear to have been as intensive or effective as she claimed. She had exhibited light sarcasm, she had nearly smiled, and according to her records, she had failed at the nerve pinch and sustained multiple minor injuries during holodeck combat training. Her physical strength and agility were also less developed than those of a typical Vulcan.

A small creaking sound caught their attention and a sleepy voice whined from the kitchen door.

“I can’t sleep. Can I have a roll?” It was the little girl T’Mollek had seen at the beach. Her hair was even more unruly. She was still barefoot, but now she wore a nightgown and was carrying a teddy bear.

Negan wiped his mouth on his napkin and set it down next to his plate. “Excuse me. I’ll only be a minute.” He took a roll, tossed it into the air, and caught it with his other hand.

“You mean one of these rolls?” he asked sweetly.

“Yayyy,” was the quiet but pleased response.

They disappeared around the corner.

“One of the patients?” T’Mollek asked Del.

He shook his head. “The last remaining child who has not taken ill.”

“My understanding was that they were all ill. What has kept her safe?”

“We don't know. When the others started getting sick, Jaxon kept her secluded from them. She lives with him here, away from the hospital. She is not allowed to leave the house on her own. And absolutely forbidden from going near the hospital.”

“And neither you nor Jaxon have experienced any symptoms?”

“No. The three of us have been the only ones not affected. I had thought we carried some sort of immunity, being from off-planet, but Elgie is native to Algalon.”

“And Dr. Hall died from it.”

“Dr. Hall told Jaxon that she had actually been born on Betagon herself. Same genetics as Algalonians.”

“Really. And all of you eat the same food and drink the same water as the children who are ill?”

“Yes. As did the doctor. Everything the colonists ate or drank had been imported from the two sister planets. We brought crops and animals to help the last remaining survivors. But by the time we arrived, most of them were already dead or near death. All but Jaxon and the children.”

“The symptoms, particularly the black rash, could also indicate . . . Terothka virus, asteria poisoning, even radiation or nerve sickness . . .” T’Mollek theorized.

“Yes, but only with Tarsen’s does the end stage include . . .”

“Yes. The vomiting of blood as the gastrointestinal organs rapidly dissolve.”

Del set his fork down, pretty much finished with dinner.

T’Mollek didn’t notice. “A human, an Algalonian, and a Berellian, all of whose species have a nonexistent chance of survival of Tarsen’s without treatment, brought together by chance and find themselves immune to the disease.”

“Yes, but what could be the common thread?” Del pondered. “It is a complete mystery.”

“No matter how far we advance, nature will always find a way to confound us. Tarsen’s can be difficult to detect with a simple tricorder scan, as can Terothka or asteria poisoning. After dinner, I would like to check on the status of the samples I took this afternoon. The deeper analysis should at least prove definitively what we are dealing with. Then we can work on finding a cure. Do you have a key to the hospital?”

“No. President Traegar has the only key.”

As if on cue, “President Traegar” returned to the table. “So, Dr. O'Reilly, I’ve heard a lot about your heroism.”

“From whom?” she asked suspiciously, looking him in the eye.

“Commander Riker. He speaks very highly of you and your courage.”

“Was he being sarcastic?”

Negan laughed. “What? No! He said you rescued a child from a crumbling mine.”

“It was a cave with narrow passageways,” she said, carefully downplaying the danger and the terror she had felt, “but I wouldn't consider it crumbling.”

“You interrogated an Andorian prisoner?” he went on.

“Counselor Troi, an empath interrogated him. I merely assisted. And he was quite young, barely out of adolescence.”

“And you played a big part in a mission to save the Earth from a race called the . . . Blow Torches?”

“The Blotorkians. And it is doubtful the Earth was ever in any real danger. The Blotorkians are barely capable of interstellar flight.”

All of these things were, technically, true.

“Your parents were decorated Starfleet officers or something, weren’t they?” he asked. “It looks like you’re following in their heroic footsteps.”

“I was in the right place at the right time,” she said humbly. “It was all circumstance.”

He twisted his mouth into a half-smirk. “Ehhh, one heroic feat might be circumstance,” he said, not quite buying her humility. “Two may be coincidence. But three . . .? is a pattern.” He smiled at her. “Your parents must be very proud.”

She looked him in the eye. “My parents are dead.”

“I’m sorry. When did they die?”

“When I was a very young girl,” she said.

“What happened?”

T’Mollek opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She closed her mouth and looked away. With a new wave of nausea, she remembered why she had been sent here and why the fight or flight instinct was so strong when she was near Negan.

_You murdered them._

“I'm sorry,” he said sympathetically against her silence. “This must be hard to talk about. I shouldn’t have . . .”

T’Mollek nodded and two tears escaped her eyes. Del had been looking back and forth at them, uncomfortably. He pushed his chair back from the table, ready to get up and comfort her if necessary.

T’Mollek cleared her throat and said shakily, “I apologize. If you would excuse me, I would like to . . .”

“Yeah, yeah, of course,” Negan said with concern. “The restroom is down that hallway, to the left.”

She put a hand to her face and put her head down as she quickly rose from the table and went around the corner down the hall. The instant she was out of their eyesight, she stood straight up, peeled the invisible microphone from her cheek, and walked into Negan’s office at the end of the hallway, the floorboards making more noise than she would have thought possible. In one swift motion, she attached the microphone to the bottom of Negan’s desk in the dark.

She heard a creaking behind her and turned around. Negan’s large, imposing form was standing in the doorway. In silhouette, he appeared to be even more than a foot taller than her, and she couldn’t see the expression on his face.

There was an interminable silence. Finally, Negan’s low, menacing voice rumbled, “This is my office. The restroom is to the _left_.” She saw him cock his head to the left toward the appropriate room.

“My apologies,” she said, holding her hand to her bandaged forehead. “I’m afraid I’m still a bit disoriented.”

“You’ve had an extremely stressful day,” he said in a low tone. “Maybe I was wrong to make you come to dinner tonight.”

“No, I’m fine.”

Her eyes had adjusted to the dark and she could see his eyes staring at her. Again, there was a long moment of silence, both sets of eyes trained on one another’s. T’Mollek felt a strange feeling in her belly. _Adrenaline rush_ , she thought. _The blood has rerouted from my stomach to my limbs._

_Fight or flight._

Finally, Negan broke the silence again. His voice was softer but a little amused. “You were looking for the restroom?”

“Yes, of course.”

His face broke out in a charming smile, and he indicated the way with his left hand. “This way.”

Once she was behind closed doors in the restroom, T’Mollek washed her tear-stained face. She listened via the invisible ear bud. She could hear Negan and Del faintly in the kitchen.

“Is she all right?” Del was asking with concern.

“Yep.”

“You have pushed her too far today,” Del said, a bit nervously.

“I know.”

“Please let her go so she can get some sleep,” Del begged.

“She was in my office.”

“She took a wrong turn.”

“Yes,” Negan said. “She certainly did.”

Then the only sound was of flatware against plates. T’Mollek returned to the table, her face expressionless.

“Pardon me, gentlemen.”

“Not at all, Doctor,” Negan said. “Ya know, I’ve thought more about myself than you in my . . . eagerness to make you feel welcome. I’m sure you’re looking forward to a nice, long sleep.”

“I am. Thank you.”

He stood. “Then we’ll wish you goodnight.”

“Thank you,” she said. Then she asked, “Mr. President? I would like to review the results of the scan.”

Negan opened his mouth to respond, but Del spoke up. “Doctor, it’s late. You have had a very difficult trip. I think it’s time you sleep. The tests can wait until morning.” His eyes had an almost pleading look to them. T’Mollek had spent enough time among emotional beings to recognize the warning in his look.

“Of course,” she said, knowing she had already overstepped her bounds by sneaking into Negan’s office. She turned to him and added, “I will be at the hospital _promptly_ at dawn.”

Negan opened his mouth to argue, but then grinned. “Awright then. I’ll meet you to the door.”


	3. Little Girls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan is so protective of little Elgie. But T'Mollek sees through her 4-year-old innocent act.

Promptly at dawn, T’Mollek arrived at the front door of the hospital. The door was still locked. She looked impatiently at Negan’s house across the road. There was no sign of him.

She looked through the glass of the door at the lab. The faint sound of her beeping tricorder was drowned out by a loud squealing. She turned to her left and a swine was running toward her. The fence had not yet been repaired. She ran into the woods after the animal, but she was unable to find it.

She stopped by Data’s tent to ask him to repair the fence, and he set out to do so.

T’Mollek returned to the hospital an hour after she had initially arrived. The door was standing open. She entered, closed the door, and walked straight into the lab. She saw movement from behind a table and went to investigate. She crouched down to look beneath the table.

Elgie was crouched in the corner.

“You are not supposed to be in here,” T’Mollek said. “It is not safe for you.”

“I'm not here,” Elgie said, closing her eyes.

“That is not logical. You are speaking to me. You are here.”

“I'm not.”

“You _are_. It’s OK. My name is Dr. T’Mollek. What is your name?”

“Elgie.”

“Hello, Elgie. What are you doing in here?”

“I heared music.”

“There is no music playing here.”

“I heared it. It sounded like, ‘Bee boop boop bee bllloop!’” She imitated electronic chiming.

“Ah yes, that was my tricorder. It means my analysis is complete. And you need to go back home. President Traegar will be worried.”

“Okaaaayyy,” Elgie said grumbling, crawling out from under the table.

T’Mollek turned back to the front desk to check the results, but her tricorder wasn’t there.

“Elgie. Where is my tricorder?”

“What's a tricorder?”

 _Infinite patience in infinite combinations_ , T’Mollek thought. “The machine that made the music,” she said aloud.

“I don't know.”

“What did you do with it?”

“I didn't do _anysing_ with it,” she said, offended by the accusation. “I just heared the music and wanted to find it.”

“And when you found it, where did you put it?”

Elgie stormed toward T’Mollek, fists flying. “I. Didn't. Put it. ANYWHERE!”

T’Mollek held Elgie’s fists in hers. The little girl was remarkably strong.

“Elgie, it's all right that you moved it. But I need it back, so I can help the other children get better. Please,” T’Mollek said soothingly, slowly crouching down and looked steadily at the child even as she held her wrists firmly. “It is all right. You are not in trouble. I need your help to find my machine. Please?”

She slowly released Elgie’s left wrist and reached her right hand toward the little girl’s face. Her fingertips had just brushed her cheek and were about to establish a mind link when a loud voice interrupted.

“What the holy hell is goin’ on in here?”

T’Mollek yanked her hand away guiltily, stood up straight, and turned to face Negan.

“Elgie,” Negan said with quiet intensity, “go back to the house. NOW.”

The little girl did not waste a single instant and ran outside.

Fiercely cool and controlled, Negan seethed, “Whaddayou think you're doin’? I have _managed_ to keep this child _safe_ from this _disease_ . . . and you _dare_ to bring her here, to the _heart_ of it?” The emotion brought out a lilting dialect. All his polite decorum from the previous day was gone.

“I did not bring her,” T’Mollek said. “I found her here. She took my tricorder.”

He made an exaggeratedly incredulous face. “I beg your–? How _dare_ you?”

“She heard the tones of the tricorder and she came inside to see it. The tricorder is now missing.”

“And she told you she took it?”

“She denied taking it.”

“Well, there you are. She didn’t take it.”

“Someone took it.”

“Who could have possibly taken it? One of the six dying children down the hall locked in quarantine? Del? Myself? Data?”

“Then where is it?”

Del, having heard the raised voices through the open door, entered. “Is anything the matter?”

“Dr. O’Reilly let Elgie into the hospital—which I _know_ you told her was forbidden,” Negan said, barely keeping the anger out of his voice. “And now she’s misplaced her tricorder.”

“Misplaced it?”

“It was taken,” T’Mollek corrected. “I left it here on this table last night to analyze these samples. The samples are still here. The tricorder is not.”

“Didn't you take it with you last night before dinner?” Del asked.

“Ah, that’s right, you did,” said Negan, remembering. “I handed it to you to take down to the beach to scan the water and the marine life.”

“That’s right!” Del agreed.

“That was what you _suggested_ ,” T’Mollek said. “However, after you left, I set the tricorder _here_ to run analysis on the samples.”

“No, you were disoriented. You must have taken it with you to the beach for your swim,” Negan argued.

“I did not have a swim.”

“But you were at the beach,” Negan reminded her. “You tracked sand into my home. Not that I mind, of course. But you were at the beach. Were you not?”

“I—yes, I was,” she said. “I was drawn by the sound of Elgie’s screams. She was playing, but I did not know that at the time. I then returned to my tent to prepare for dinner.”

“Well, in your haste to ‘rescue’ a playing child,” Negan said with mild sarcasm, “you must have dropped the tricorder on the beach. I hope you weren't near the cliff. If you dropped it onto the rocks below. . . .”

“I saw and heard the tricorder last night after dinner _and_ this morning. Right there on that desk.”

“And yet,” said Negan reasonably, “the tricorder is _not_ here.”

“That is because Elgie took it,” she said, even more reasonably.

“She’s not a thief,” he said, a hard glint in his eye.

“No. But she is a little girl and it was a shiny object that made music and had pretty, blinking lights.”

“She doesn’t steal. Or lie.”

“When she was hiding from me, she stated that she was ‘not here.’ Children her age cannot tell the dif—”

Del stepped in tensely, yet diplomatically. “I feel as if we are going around in circles. Doctor, you've had a difficult couple of days. A head injury, little sleep . . . hunger. Check the beach? Hmm? I’ll help you look.”

T’Mollek glared at them both for a moment, then said, “Very well.”

 _Fight_ , she thought. _Definitely fight._

_***_

Del and T’Mollek traveled south, past the row of tents and Negan’s house, toward the cliffside beach.

“I have no doubt Elgie took that tricorder,” Del said as soon as they were out of earshot. “She took Dr. Hall’s tricorder when we first arrived, as well. We eventually found it on the rocks near the sea, completely destroyed. She never did admit to having taken it. She no doubt brought yours here or to one of her other hiding spots. We’re bound to find it sooner or later.”

“Preferably sooner,” T’Mollek said. “It is our only hope in diagnosing and properly treating the children’s illness.”

“Doesn’t the android have a tricorder?”

“Yes, but his was destroyed in the crash,” she said. “Regardless, his was programmed only for engineering, not medical analysis.”

“You call it a ‘him’?”

“He was created as a male,” said T’Mollek. “He identifies as male. We call him . . . ‘him.’”

“Interesting. That will take some getting used to.”

“I assume he made a bit of progress, working all night as he did?”

“Yes,” Del said. “It’s remarkable. We are now fully solar powered. He is working on an irrigation system today. This will change everything.”

“Yes,” T’Mollek said sardonically. “A replicator would have changed everything, as well.”

They arrived at the beach, and T’Mollek apprehensively searched the caves along with Del. These caves were much more wide open than the one on Syroda had been, so they didn’t cause quite as much anxiety, although she didn’t particularly like being in them.

“I thought you said Jaxon doesn’t allow Elgie out of the house alone,” T’Mollek said.

“He doesn’t know she comes here. I’ve watched her. She’s exceedingly careful. I think she has an enhanced sense of her own mortality, given the deaths of so many of her friends.”

“Not to mention her parents,” T’Mollek added pensively.

“Yes. They were apparently among the first casualties of war three years ago,” Del said. “She was barely walking when they died.”

“Does she remember them?”

“I doubt it,” Del said sadly, “although she speaks of them as though she does. Her parents owned a sweets shop at the far west side of the city, just past the big hill. It was the first building hit by the Romulans’ ground attack.”

“Why did they attack from the ground?”

“The orbital skirmishes resulted in ionic radiation clouds that prevented their systems from firing accurately from space. They had to send ground teams in shuttles to invade. The colonists were peaceful, more or less. Most were here for petty crimes, nothing violent. Their only defense was from the militia that guarded them. They were no match.”

“Have you been to the city? Seen the aftermath?” she asked.

“Yes. We make supply runs every once in a while, but not much is left,” Del said with a heavy voice. “It’s a miracle anyone survived to be captured at all.”

In vain they continued searching the caves for the tricorder until midday before returning to the hospital, where T’Mollek suggested they search as well. After looking in every room on the first floor, Del suggested the second.

  
“The door is blocked by rubble,” T’Mollek said.

“The door on the _west_ side of the building,” he concurred. “The door on the east side is merely locked, but I have something we could use to detonate the lock.”

He took her next door to the garage behind the barn. She had brought the second wireless transmitter in her pocket and took the opportunity to quietly place it under a shelf near their workspace while Del searched a tool chest.

He found a small wireless detonator in the chest, and they returned to the school. They went upstairs and Del attached the small box to the doorknob leading to the second floor. He pressed a series of buttons on the box, and took T’Mollek’s hand, pulling her back away from the door. He stood in front of her, shielding her with his body chivalrously. She smiled. The tiny detonator blew the lock off the door. T’Mollek tried to push the door open but it was blocked by something on the other side and was completely immovable. T’Mollek looked up and saw a ventilation shaft above the door.

She sighed. _Why does it always have to be crawlspaces?_

She asked Del for a boost. She removed the cover of the ventilation shaft and shimmied through to the other side.

“Did you find anything?” called Del from the top of the stairwell.

“Pay dirt!” she called back.

“Excuse me?”

“A phrase my grandfather used to say. I’ll be right out.”

She returned through the shaft and handed him several microscopes, slides, and books through the hole above the door.

“What are those?” Del asked in confusion.

“Relics,” she answered. “But they may allow me to see what we’re dealing with and make a diagnosis. I will have to rely on my memory and my ability to recognize microscopic particles. Tarsen’s disease and asteria poisoning are difficult to detect but easy to recognize.”

“You actually think the children have been poisoned?”

“Tarsen’s disease follows a pattern, which this epidemic has not. The symptoms are similar to those of asteria ingestion. Vomiting. Fever. Respiratory distress. The black rash. The children could have ingested it without anyone knowing.”

“But none of the children have eaten solid food in months,” Del pointed out. “Would they still be this sick?”

T’Mollek sighed. “No. It would have metabolized within weeks of last ingestion. Perhaps it is seeping into the water supply.”

“But there is nothing growing near the well,” Del told her. “Perhaps the Romulans contaminated the village during the raids.”

She shook her head. “Romulans are particularly susceptible to the effects of asteria, just as they are to Tarsen’s. It would seem unlikely that they would take such a risk of poisoning or biological warfare if they invaded on the ground.”

She could have told Del that the man he knew as Jaxon Traegar was actually, Negan, a former professional wrestler and politico who had helped a scientist create both an illness and its cure that resulted in tens of thousands of deaths before they cashed in. That he had the knowledge and the means to create something similar here. But although she knew the means and the opportunity, for the life of her, there was no motive that she could think of. Furthermore, she wasn’t sure if she trusted Del. He seemed a bit obsequious to Negan and a little afraid of him. Perhaps they were working together. Or perhaps Del was responsible.

Therefore she kept her suspicions to herself.

“Perhaps it was brought here by a prisoner ship before the war,” she theorized.

“There were restrictions on imports,” Del said, “although someone on the security force may have been in on it.”

“And if so, they are all dead, captured, or off-planet. There were no known survivors of the Romulan attack other than the children and Jaxon.”

She paused and studied Del’s face. “How much do you trust Jaxon?”

Del smiled openly. “Doctor, I assure you, Jaxon loves these children. He lives to protect them. When Dr. Hall and I arrived, he was desperate to ensure their health and safety from the Romulans. And when they started falling ill . . . he was devastated. I’ve seen him with them, when he doesn’t know I’m there. He reads to them. He sings to them. He weeps over them. He holds their hands. He loves those children. Trust me. He is not responsible for this.”

“Then this is a true mystery,” she said.

“One that could most likely be solved by finding that tricorder,” Del added.

“Until we locate it,” T’Mollek said, “let’s see what our microscopes can tell us.”

They went downstairs and set up the microscopes in the lab. T’Mollek went to check on the children in the quarantine room.

Negan was sitting by the bedside of the smallest patient, a tiny boy named Adiv. Negan was softly singing him a lullaby. The melody was familiar but T’Mollek couldn’t place it. As she stood in the doorway listening, her eyes filled with tears. She felt the conflicting emotional reactions of safety and danger.

When he was finished, she cleared her throat and he looked up. He walked out of the room with her and closed the door.

“Did you find the tricorder?” he asked gruffly but eagerly, his eyes shining with emotion.

“We did not. However, we did find microscopes. They are primitive, but I should be able to take cultures and blood and tissue samples from the children as well as from you and Del to determine what anomalies are present. It will take time, but . . . research is a particular specialty of mine. I will find the cure.”

“We asked for stronger medication to treat the Tarsen’s disease. That’s all we need.”

“Based on the course of this illness and the fact that the medications previously used did not result in a cure, I am not convinced we are dealing with Tarsen’s. Without knowing exactly what is causing the illness, I run the risk of poisoning the children with a potential cure.”

He sighed. “No, we can’t have that.”

“Indeed not.”

“Well, let’s get started,” Negan said accommodatingly. “You set up your equipment and I’ll help you gather whatever . . . samples you need.”

“Do you have medical training?” she asked.

“I’ve been tending to these children for the past year,” his eyes heavy with sorrow. “Administered their injections, their intravenous fluids. I’ve had to learn the hard way.”

“Good enough,” she said. “I’ll make a list of what I need.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Elgie is basically my daughter when she was 3, which is when I started writing this. She becomes one of my favorite characters.


	4. Slave of Duty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan works T'Mollek to the bone and teaches her who's boss.

Over the next two weeks, T’Mollek and Negan worked side by side in the lab. She spent all her time there, and Negan divided his time between the lab, the garage with Del and Data, and the field. Negan served as her lab assistant, preparing samples of well water, ocean water, soil, rock, plant, food, blood, urine, stools, skin, hair, and nails from every living person and animal in the compound. With all their work, however, T’Mollek was no closer to finding an answer than she had been on her first day.

She worked twenty-four hours a day, seldom taking time to eat, and taking no time to sleep. At the end of the second week, she was beginning to feel the effects.

One afternoon she returned from the quarantine room to check a new set of blood samples she had taken that morning. Organizing the samples was challenging because Algalonians shared one basic blood type. There were similarities to Romulan blood, which was to be expected, given their purported common ancestry. She was washing her hands when Negan asked her when she was going to label the slides.

“I labeled them before I checked on the children,” she said, drying her hands.

“Uh . . . no. You didn’t. Look.”

She looked and the slides were unmarked, save one, which had her neat printing. Unfortunately, the slide had her own name on it, whereas the blood on the slide was red. There was no way to determine whose blood was whose among the children, thereby negating their effectiveness.

“I think someone needs a nap,” he said grimly as he threw all the samples out with barely controlled fury.

“I’ll collect more samples first,” she said, humiliated and angry with herself, heading for the door.

“No,” he stopped her with a hand on her arm. She looked down at it and then up at him, warningly. He removed it, but continued in a tense voice, “Those kids have had enough blood sucked from them for one week. Give ‘em some time to recover, for fuck’s sake.”

The pejorative took her aback, but she felt it was justified under the circumstances. “You’re right,” she agreed. “Instead, I think we should exhume the bodies of the dead in order to perform autopsies.”

He gaped at her. “Are you kidding me right now? Didn’t you bother to learn anything about Algalonian culture before you came down here?”

“What do you mean?”

“Their religion strictly forbids exhumation or mutilation of a dead body.”

She took a deep breath and looked at the ceiling. “I was not aware of that.”

Feeling thoroughly dejected, T’Mollek returned to her tent for the nap Negan had suggested. But rather than sleeping, she opened one of the anatomy journals she had found in the second floor science classroom and started reading.

***

At the beginning of the third week, Negan handed T’Mollek a clipboard and a pen.

“What is this?” she asked, her voice thick with exhaustion and confusion.

“Your duty roster and your timesheet,” Negan said. “It’s one of the rules. I know what you’re thinkin’. Seems trivial. But ya gotta prove you’re makin’ the most of your time here. Pullin’ your weight. I should have given this to you when you got here, but I thought it might work without. I was wrong.”

“What is a ‘timesheet’?”

“You write down your hours,” Negan explained with the patronizing patience of a condescending boss. “When you come in, what you do, how long it takes you, when you leave. I want to see breaks written into this timesheet, T’Mollek. Eating and resting are important. You look like shit. Your clothes are hanging off you, you have dark green circles under your eyes. Pull yourself together.”

“Yes, sir,” she said. She knew he wasn’t wrong. She had had to cut a new hole in her belt to hold her pants up. She felt herself growing physically weaker. She hadn’t had time to work out or exercise. She had expected the children to be cured by now and her other, unofficial, assignment carried out. She had expected to have a medical staff helping care for the children and assisting in the lab.

She was failing, just as T’Sharr had always told her she would. She had worked her entire life for this, blending in, appearing weak, and ironically, she was proving herself to be just that. She didn’t have the physical energy to handle the emotion and her eyes threatened to well with tears.

Seeing her near-emotional response, Negan softened. He handed her a bottle of water. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. I know you’re under just as much stress as I am here.”

“I understand,” she said, taking a drink. The cool water helped clear her head. “Thank you.”

She took a prepared blood sample and placed it in a container. She took a long thin instrument and began stirring it vigorously. She noticed out of the corner of her eye that Negan was watching her.

“So, uh, Doctor,” he began, “I couldn’t help but notice the kids’ linens haven’t been changed yet. You plannin’ on putting that laundry in sometime today?”

“I am preparing a hemoglobin electrophoresis with the new blood samples,” she said, fully herself again. “This will take several hours. Could you take care of it?”

He chuckled as if he didn’t quite know how to respond to her insolence. “Could I take care of the laundry . . .” he said, then breathed a loud sigh and let it out with a huff. “I have better things to do than domestic chores. I need to help Del and Data with the computer connections. They think they’re close to bringing up the library network. We’ll have access to much more medical and farming knowledge when this is accomplished. We might even be able to figure out how to contain the ion fluctuations and regain communications and transporter capabilities.”

When he received no response from her, he added with a little chuckle, “And that laundry isn’t gonna wash itself.”

She bristled at the insinuation that “domestic chores” were beneath him but not her. Reminding herself to remain dutiful and obedient and not to rock the boat, she said evenly, “I understand that. But I must continue stirring this sample manually, as I do not have a mixer to do it.”

“It can wait,” he said. “Solar power’s runnin’ out, and it’s gonna rain later, so we can’t just hang it out to dry overnight. It has to be done right now while there’s still sun. Not in an hour. _Now_.”

She looked at him, wondering if he was merely testing her ability to follow his capricious orders. “Perhaps you could stir while I launder?”

“For several hours?” Negan asked with a disbelieving smirk. “Do you think maybe if the library network were up and running, you might get some answers that your _non-existent_ tricorder isn’t helping you with?”

“If I stop this now,” she said glaring at him, “I will have wasted three hours of work and an entire sample of Doston’s blood.”

Negan shrugged exaggeratedly. “That’s not my problem. _You_ need to learn to manage _your_ time. Sanitary laundry is a top priority in a hospital setting. Or do you think that’s beneath you?”

She bristled again at this double standard but only said, “I will need to take more of that boy’s blood.”

“I’ll get you a sample while you’re washing the sheets.”

“Would it not take the same amount of time to place the sheets in the laundry as it would to take a blood sample?”

Negan was losing patience and no longer finding this amusing. “Read your duty roster. Number one duty: Laundry. Number one means you do that _first_. Would you _please_ just fuckin’ do it already? If it doesn’t get done now, it’ll never get fuckin’ done. Those kids aren’t gonna get any better sleepin’ in their own filth.” He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying to regain control. He looked back at her, his normally light brown eyes were dark and hard, and his voice was a low, tense rumble. “ _Please_.”

She set her jaw and said softly, through gritted teeth, “Do you not want me to cure these children?”

Negan’s face softened so slightly a full-blooded Vulcan would never have noticed. T’Mollek remembered Troi’s words. _He is strongly paternal. He is deeply protective of the children. I sensed regret . . . guilt. He feels helpless._

It took Negan a moment to find the words. He said, just as softly, “I want nothing more. But this isn’t one you’re gonna win. Do. The Fucking. Laundry.”

T’Mollek knew how dangerous a powerful, erratic man could be when he felt helpless. Standing up to him and backing him into a corner wasn’t going to solve anything. He was big-dogging her and there wasn’t a thing she could do about it.

She returned his glare, deliberately stopped stirring the sample, lifted her hand, and dropped the stirrer. It clattered loudly to the desk. Without a word, she stood and stalked out the door to the waiting laundry cart, pushing it down the hall to the laundry room.

Negan watched her with grim satisfaction. He’d only just begun to teach her who was in charge here.

***

T’Mollek was stirring dozens of blood samples and trying to keep them all stirred at the same time. They were stacked on top of each other. Negan walked in with a bottle of water and tossed it her way. The bottle smashed the stack of blood samples, and she was showered with blood. She screamed—

The sound of the scream directly in her ear woke her out of the nightmare. She plucked out the earbud she kept in at all times to monitor what was happening in Negan’s office. Realizing she was lying on her own cot in her own tent, she placed the earbud back and listened. Once she was satisfied that Elgie was fine, she went back to sleep.

***

The next morning, T’Mollek left her tent and headed for the hospital. Negan and Elgie were leaving their house. They wore swimsuits and Negan was carrying towels and a picnic basket.

“Good morning, Elgie,” T’Mollek said. “I haven’t seen much of you lately.”

Elgie shyly buried her face in Negan’s leg.

Rubbing her shoulder comfortingly, Negan explained, “She hasn’t been feeling well lately.”

Concerned and eyeing Negan, T’Mollek crouched down to Elgie, feeling her forehead. “Oh. Anything I can help her with?”

Negan brushed it off. “Naw, just a little cold. She’s been taking it easy at the house.”

Bashfully, but eager to share this exciting bit of news, Elgie announced, “I dot stunned by a bee.”

“You got stung by a bee?” T’Mollek said sympathetically. “Oh my. That sounds painful. Are you all right?”

“Yeah,” she said. “I’m not a ‘lergic or anysing.”

“Well, that is fortunate,” T’Mollek said. “May I see the point of entry?”

Elgie looked at her blankly.

“The place where you were stung?” she amended.

Elgie held her bare foot out to T’Mollek, who inspected the mark.

“You’ve expertly removed the stinger,” she told Negan. “There is barely a trace of venom or irritation.”

Negan grinned laconically. “I’ve removed a stinger or two in my day. Oh, your duty roster is in the lab. No laundry today. Just bloodwork.”

“Thank you.”

“All right, Elgie,” he said with talking-to-a-small-child forced enthusiasm. “You ready to head to the beach?”

Still clinging to his leg, she agreed.

“Let’s go,” he said, pulling his leg stiffly and dragging her along.

Elgie, still holding on, giggled, then asked T’Mollek, “Do you wanna come with us, Do’tor? We’re dunna swim and den have a pitnit lunch.”

T’Mollek was just about to accept the kind invitation when Negan cut in, “She’s got a lot of work to do, sweetheart. We need to leave her to it. The fall planting starts tomorrow.”

They walked away without a second look. T’Mollek went to the lab, picked up her clipboard, and looked at her chores list. First item: refill the IVs. Next, bloodwork. She sighed, then went to the sink and filled a container with water to boil.


	5. Month 2: Farmer's Wife Refuted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Negan comes up with new chores for T'Mollek and she works her way into his home, where she hopes to uncover his secrets and expose him for the murderer he is.

T’Mollek was deep in blissfully dreamless REM sleep just before dawn when she was wrenched awake by a pounding on her tent door and Negan’s voice calling her name.

T’Mollek didn’t have time to put a robe on over her pajamas—a gray, flowing shirt with matching pants that reached her calves. She opened the door hurriedly. “What is it? The children?”

“Naw, they’re fine,” he said easily. “I need you to milk the cows, gather the eggs, and feed the livestock.”

She knew she was having another nightmare. “I . . . You . . . _What_?”

“Today we start planting the fall crops,” he said. “You knew that. It’s all hands on deck.”

She took a long moment to ponder her response, then said, “I’m a doctor, not a—”

“A farmer, I know,” he finished with a grin, putting his hands up apologetically. “But we all have to chip in and help out or we’re gonna run out of food.”

“But . . . the crops you plant now won’t be ready to harvest until . . . late fall or early spring. None of us will be here then.”

“Well, ya never know,” he said. “I like to be prepared.” He glanced down at her bare legs and added softly, “You do have ankles. Whaddya know?”

Looking him in the eyes, she closed the door in his grinning face.

She made her bed and got dressed in her uniform as she always did. It was a sweltering day but the fabric of her long-sleeved uniform was designed to regulate body temperature in most settings. She pulled her long curly red hair back into a ponytail.

She reported to Negan, who had her clipboard waiting for her. Gather eggs. Milk cows. Slop pigs. Brush horse. Sweep barn.

Dutifully, she got to work.

As she was pouring buckets of slop into the pigs’ trough, she wiped the sweat away from her brow. Negan startled her by saying over her shoulder, “I didn’t know Vulcans sweated.”

“This one does,” she admitted ruefully.

“Does she also sunburn?” he asked charmingly, holding out a large-brimmed sun hat.

“She does indeed,” she said, taking the hat from Negan with a miniscule smile at his unexpected thoughtfulness. “Thank you.”

***

All that week, T’Mollek worked like—well, like a work horse—and it was not doing her uncontrollable curls any favors. She had worn her hair long for a variety of reasons—rebellion, cultural pride, familial tribute. But it was no longer worth it.

One morning, nearly five weeks after she had arrived on Algalon, she took a scissors from the barn and hacked her hair off into a short, sensible hairdo.

When she met Negan in the barn that morning, he did a double take. “What the fu . . .” he said.

“I cut my hair,” she said flatly.

“It looks nice,” he said, a little dubiously. “But why?”

“It was time. I had kept it long out of a sense of defiance against expectations.”

“Quite a human characteristic,” he said with a twinkle in his eye.

“That is not the first time such an accusation has been made against me.”

“I didn’t mean it as an accusation.”

“Defiance has been an unfortunate characteristic I have displayed all too often throughout my life,” she admitted.

“A little defiance is good for the soul,” he said.

“I do not believe in the soul,” she said defiantly. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have . . .” She consulted her clipboard. “Beans to pick.”

Negan watched with a grin as she marched off.

***

As T’Mollek picked beans, Elgie approached her in the field and offered T’Mollek half of her sandwich. In an effort to get to know the child, she accepted with thanks. Unfortunately, the sandwich was dry, bland, and disgusting.

“Even by Vulcan standards,” T’Mollek said, “this is not palatable.”

“What’s pallable mean?” Elgie wanted to know.

“Easily eaten.”

“Oh, yeah,” Elgie said sagely. “Dis sammich is _not_ pallable.”

A thought occurred to T’Mollek and she started to enact a bit of a plan. Via the wireless receiver, she’d been listening to Negan writing furiously in his office late into the night and making frustrated groans and mutterings. She wanted to know what he was working on, but she hadn’t been invited into his house since the welcome dinner over a month ago. She had hoped that enough time had passed that he had forgotten her “mistaken” foray into his office that night when she planted the listening device and that she might be able to gain entrance into his office to spy.

“Elgie,” she said slyly, “have you ever had . . . butter?” She said the word enticingly.

“I _sink_ so,” Elgie thought. “Is dat like milk?”

“Well, it’s made with milk. A little butter would make that bread _far_ more palatable.”

“I wanna try some butter!”

“It’s fairly easy to make,” she said. “Would you like to help me?”

“Yes, yes!” Elgie said excitingly.

“Oh, dear,” T’Mollek said, placing a forefinger on her chin with disappointed realization. “I’m afraid I cannot. I don’t have any cream or electronic blending devices in my tent.”

“Oh, dear,” Elgie repeated with her finger on her chin, just as disappointed. T’Mollek waited expectantly. Elgie’s face then lit up and she gasped, “I know! _We_ have cream and a ‘lectonic bending advice in _our_ house!”

“You do?” T’Mollek asked innocently.

Elgie grabbed T’Mollek’s hand and tugged her forcibly toward the house. “Come, come! We have cream in the ‘furgerator. We can make butter in our ‘leconic avice.”

“Elgie,” T’Mollek protested. “I am not allowed in your home. I live _there_ in my tent. That is your house and Jaxon’s. It’s not my place to go there.”

Elgie thought for a moment, then gasped again. “I have a _great_ idea! I’ll ask Dzaxon would he like some butter and could you go inside and use our lecka-lecka-vise!”

T’Mollek shook her head as though gamely giving up. “Very well! If you think that a wise course of action.”

Elgie smiled happily up at her, proud of her own ingenuity but not quite understanding T’Mollek’s words. She paused a beat and said, “I think I do!” She held a finger up. “I’ll be right back!”

The wild-haired girl dashed off to find Negan, who was in the garage with Del and Data, working on the communications network. T’Mollek looked up at the house and wondered how much time she would be granted alone in there and how long it would be before Negan trusted her to be there unaccompanied.


	6. Chance and Chemistry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> T'Mollek surprises Negan with her prowess in positive discipline.

Tempted by the promise of butter and other culinary delights, Negan warily welcomed T’Mollek into his home that afternoon. She poured the cream into a jar along with a little salt and honey. She placed the lid on the jar and began to shake it vigorously.

Negan and Elgie watched in fascination.

“This’ll never work,” Negan teased with a serious expression.

“Yes, it will!” Elgie exclaimed.

“Thank you for your faith in me, Elgie,” T’Mollek said. “You shall have the first taste.”

After a few minutes, Elgie asked if she could help. T’Mollek handed her the jar and admonished her to be very careful not to let the jar slip. She told her to shake it as hard but as carefully as she could.

Elgie let loose. She surprised T’Mollek and Negan by maintaining a strong grip on the jar for several minutes.

“It’s starting to feel . . . gallumphier,” Elgie said thoughtfully.

“Ah,” said T’Mollek knowingly. “That means it’s almost ready. The butter is solidifying and is ‘gallumphing’ among the buttermilk against the sides of the jar.”

Negan stifled a chuckle that turned into a cough. T’Mollek gave him a mild, expressionless look. “Do you need a drink of water?”

He smiled at her, his eyes crinkling at the edges. “Naw, I’m good.”

The butter was a success. Elgie had actually done most of the work. They spread it on several pieces of bread and enjoyed their first meal all together, standing over the tiny kitchen table in the dimming afternoon light.

“You wouldn’t happen to have any recipes for . . . fried chicken, wouldja?” Negan wondered.

“I have recipes for roasted chickpeas,” she told him. “Far healthier.”

“Chickpeas? Are we even growing those?”

“In a remote corner of the field,” she said. “Along with pinto beans, they have been the source of much of my diet here for the past month.”

He gave her free rein of the kitchen and she prepared the meal.

“What’s for supper?” Elgie asked as she sat down at the table.

“Roasted seasoned chickpeas, a green salad, and fresh fruit,” T’Mollek answered. “And of course, dinner rolls with butter.”

Rather than squealing with delight, Elgie protested, “No! I don’t want roasted chickpeas! They’re yucky!”

“Have you tried them?”

“Well . . . no,” she confessed. “But I dest know they’re yucky.”

“You cannot possibly just know that.”

“Yes I can!” Elgie argued. “I don’t want chickpeas! I just want my regliar supper!”

“What is your regular supper?”

Elgie couldn’t recall, so she just said, “Somesing yummier!”

“Chickpeas are very yummy,” T’Mollek said.

“You don’t know everysing, you know!”

“Elgie, there are far more polite ways of expressing disagreement,” T’Mollek said. “For example, you might say, ‘T’Mollek, I respectfully disagree.’”

Elgie stormed out of the kitchen in a huff with a low growl of disdain, much like that T’Mollek had heard from Negan’s throat.

“Doctor,” he said quietly. “She's just a baby.”

“She is not a baby,” T’Mollek disagreed.

“She's a _baby_ ,” he insisted firmly as he went to the living room to collect the child.

T’Mollek gathered the platters to the table, muttering under her breath, “She's a _rude_ baby. . . .”

Negan carried Elgie in and sat her on her chair.

“Elgie, did you take your vitamin this morning?” he asked her.

“No.”

“You gotta take it every day,” he said. “It makes you healthy and strong.”

“I’ll take it tomorrow.”

Negan sighed but didn’t press it. T’Mollek walked over to the bottle of vitamins on the counter, removed one, and set it in front of Elgie, who nonchalantly swept it under her plate.

Elgie ate most of her salad but refused to eat her chickpeas. Negan handed her a buttered roll, which T’Mollek intercepted—using her bare hand, which caused Negan to give her a surprised look.

“You can eat your chickpeas and take your vitamin,” said T’Mollek, “and then you can have your roll.”

“But I don’t like vitamins, and I don’t want to eat my chickpeas. They’re gross.”

“Have you tried them?” she asked patiently.

“No.”  
  
“Then you cannot accurately assess them as ‘gross.’”

“I want my roll.”

“You can take your vitamin and eat your chickpeas and then you can have your roll,” she said again, just as matter-of-factly as before.

Staring daggers at T’Mollek, Elgie deliberately picked up her vitamin, then held her arm out over the floor, waiting to see what T’Mollek would do.

But it was Negan who spoke. “Elgie don’t—”

Without looking at him, T’Mollek held a hand up to stop him from speaking. She glared back at Elgie, who slowly put her hand to her mouth, popped the vitamin into it, and swallowed it down with a bottle of water. T’Mollek nodded.

“I don’t want to eat my chickpeas,” Elgie challenged.

“Then do not eat them.”

“You’re forcing me!”

“I am not. You do not have to eat your chickpeas.”

“But I want my roll.”

“You can eat your chickpeas and then you can have your roll.”

There was a long silence while Negan ate his chickpeas, glaring at T’Mollek. Finally, he buttered a roll and handed it to Elgie. T’Mollek reached her hand out, took the roll in her hand, and ate it immediately and somewhat exaggeratedly, making full eye contact with Elgie, whose eyes immediately flooded with tears

“NOOOOO! Dat’s not fair! You’re being mean!”

“You can eat your chickpeas and then you can have your roll.”

Red-eyed and tearful, Elgie glared at T’Mollek, who really wasn’t sure why she had chosen this battle. However, she had been watching the little girl rule the roost, as Grandma Reilly would say, and it wasn’t doing her any favors. The little girl was going to have to get used to life without Negan caring for her one day, and T’Mollek knew the best way to guide her toward maturity, independence, and self-respect.

After T’Mollek and Negan had finished their meals, Elgie casually picked up her fork and rolled three chickpeas onto it with her fingers. She put the fork to her mouth and moved her upper lip over them, drawing them into her mouth. She chewed and swallowed. Then she took another forkful and another.

“How many chickpeas do you sink I can fit in my mouf?” Elgie asked.

“I recommend no more than three or four,” T’Mollek answered.

When the last chickpea was eaten, T’Mollek silently handed her the roll.

“Thank you,” Elgie whispered.

“You are welcome, Elgie.”

Negan shook his head with a disbelieving grin.

***

Over the next two weeks, Negan invited T’Mollek over to cook more and more often. She made cheese, she made candy out of honey, she made cookies.

She enlisted Data’s assistance in fashioning small mills to grind oats into oatmeal, wheat into flour, and so on. The meals on Algalon became much more varied and enjoyable. Del seldom ate with them. He seemed to be trying to keep up with Data, who put in extraordinarily long hours, only powering down a few hours per night. But T’Mollek learned a few of Del’s favorite recipes and brought him care packages several times a week, for which he was gracious and grateful.

Negan deemed her a “magician” in the kitchen, performing culinary miracles with limited ingredients.  
  
“Cooking is neither miraculous nor magical,” T’Mollek bristled. “It’s chemistry.”

“Yeah,” Negan drawled, leaning casually over the counter and chewing on a raw green bean with a toothy, bedimpled grin. “Chemistry’s important.”

She flushed and poured the melted butter into the sauté pan.

It wasn’t the first time she had felt chemistry with Negan—or the only time he had subtly insinuated there was more between them than a working relationship.

One afternoon, she was carrying a large basket of laundry out of the house to take it to the hospital laundry room. As Negan exited his office, she lost her grip on the handle of the heavy basket. He took a few quick steps to help her. Reaching with his right hand, he took the handle she was holding with her left. Not having expected that move, she did not relinquish the handle to him.

She looked down at his strong, tanned hand, rough and warm against hers, uncertain what to do.

“You can hold onto it, too, doll, but it’ll be a lot easier if you just let go,” he said softly. She couldn’t help believing there was a double entendre in that statement.

He was a very off-balancing man, and he reveled in it.

Whenever she was in the house, she eyed Negan’s office door, but he had taken to keeping it closed. The creaking of the floorboards throughout the tiny house meant there could be no sneaking back there without being heard. And of course, Negan was always in the house when T’Mollek was.

Much to her annoyance, he had slowly begun adding domestic chores to her duty roster, such as his household dusting, vacuuming, and overall tidying up. In addition to lab work and hospital laundry, he had added the personal laundry of himself, Elgie, Del, and Data. Fortunately, Data’s uniform seldom needed laundering.

Perhaps most vexing of all was that she seemed to be becoming Elgie’s personal valet. She played with her, taught her school lessons, mended rips, and occasionally after dinner she bathed her and tucked her into bed.

T’Mollek was finding herself in Negan’s house nearly every day now—unfortunately always when Negan was also present—in addition to her daily work as a nurse, janitor, and farmhand. Diagnosis and developing a cure for the children had all but fallen by the wayside.

Meanwhile, Data and Del were still inexplicably unable to reconnect the compound’s computer network. They were not able to access the capital’s library database nor transmit external communications into space. Data had suggested visiting the capital city center which was the communication and transportation hub of the colony, but Negan wanted to wait until the next supply run was deemed crucial rather than to waste the truck’s limited fuel. They had already used up most of it traveling back and forth the hundred miles from where the _Cristoferetti_ had crashed.

Negan slowly grew to trust her, but he always kept a close eye on her. She knew that one day he would slip and leave her in the house alone—or with Elgie—and she would make her move. She not only needed to know what he was working on, but she also needed to find the evidence she was certain he was keeping beyond his office, in his bedroom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This doesn't always work on my daughter, but positive discipline really is amazing. Look it up! https://www.positivediscipline.com/


	7. Sturm & Drang

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things start to heat up a little between Negan and T'Mollek. But is Q lurking in the shadows?

Nearly sixty days into the mission and absolutely no closer to finding a cure than she had been on day one, T’Mollek was beginning to lose hope. It was also the first day that “Lab Work” was nowhere on her duty roster.

“Feed the chickens” was on her clipboard that morning, however, so she went out to the barn to where the feed was kept. Del had emptied a feed bag the previous morning, so she opened a new one.

She found that it had previously been opened and when she shoved the scoop into the bag, she pulled out a small packet that had apparently been hidden there.

She opened the packet and found what she recognized as raw miyo root, which just so happened to be an antidote to asteria poisoning.

Who might have hidden it there? Dr. Hall was a botanist and would have access to knowledge of natural poisons and their antidotes. Del or Negan might have suspected the other of poisoning the children and hidden it there to use at a later time. Elgie herself was fond of hiding small objects in random places. This might just be a strange coincidence.

She surmised that the most logical explanation was that Dr. Hall had left it there before she died, suspecting either Del or Negan of the poisoning and trusting that she would be able to use it to develop the antidote before she died. Perhaps she had not done so because her illness had progressed too rapidly or she did not have access to the equipment it would require to grind the root adequately.

Thanks to Data, however, T’Mollek did.

She pocketed the root and waited until it was time to prepare dinner for Negan and Elgie. Fortunately, that was on her roster that day as well.

In the meantime, she fed the chickens and was about to gather the eggs when Negan entered the barn.

“Change of plans. Del is handling farm duties today. You and I are goin’ to the beach.”

This was literally the last thing she had expected him to say.

“What is at the beach?” she asked evenly.

“Water . . . sand . . . sunshine . . .” Negan said with a sidelong grin. “You didn’t get that swim I told you to take when you first arrived here. All you do is work. You haven’t taken a single day off since you’ve been here. We’re taking a vacation day, you and me. At the beach.”  
  
“But what about Elgie?”

“I’ve got Data watchin’ her. This is grown-up day.” His voice was low and serious. He wasn’t messing around. This wasn’t a request.

“And . . . what shall we do at the beach?” she asked, stalling for time and trying to understand Negan’s expectations.

“Whatever we feel like,” he said easily, his arms spread open.

“I see,” she said. “Shall we go now?”

“I’m gonna pack us a picnic lunch. Meet me in half an hour. At my house.”

“Very well.”

Was this a date? T’Mollek wasn’t sure, but it certainly sounded like a date. She felt her pulse throbbing in her belly. A sudden thought crossed her mind: Q had never quite made her feel like this.

_Fight or flight?_

She put the egg basket down and went into her tent to prepare.

***

Half an hour later she arrived at Negan’s front door carrying a large hardcover book. She hesitated, then knocked on the door. He opened it, wearing shorts, sandals, and the white button-down shirt he’d worn on the day she met him. He looked her up and down, a half-smirk on his face.

“How’d I know you’d come wearing your full uniform and boots,” he asked rhetorically. “The sun hat’s a nice touch, though. Didn’t you bring a swimsuit?”

“Why would I have brought a swimsuit?”

“Of course. What was I thinkin’?” he asked, eyes to the sky. “Come in. I have something you can wear.”

She entered the house behind him. He picked something up from the couch and handed it to her. She looked down at it impassively but said nothing.

“It’s a swimsuit,” he explained. “It was Dr. Hall’s. It’ll be a little big on you, but I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

She looked up at him and handed it back to him.

“It’s a one-piece,” he said, as if that made it OK. She raised an eyebrow. “You’d rather die, wouldn’t you?”

He took the suit back and tossed it back onto the couch and picked up another bundle.

“Option B,” he said. “Meet me halfway, wouldja?”

It was one of his old T-shirts and a spare set of swimming trunks. He gave her a look that said that this, like their two-person beach party, was non-negotiable.

Wordlessly, she took the clothes into the restroom and changed.

They walked to the beach together—T’Mollek carrying the picnic basket, an umbrella, and her book, Negan carrying a lounge chair and a beach bag slung over his shoulder. T’Mollek was wearing her sun hat and a pair of large round sunglasses Negan had also given her before they left.

They arrived at the beach and Negan set up the chair and umbrella. Then he lay a large blanket out on the sand next to the chair. T’Mollek stood watching him all the while. When he was finished, he sat down on the blanket with the picnic basket in front of him. He indicated with a grand gesture that she should sit beside him, and she did.

They ate their picnic lunch, which consisted of black bean and vegetable sandwiches with aioli, fresh fruit, and cheese. After they ate and packed up the basket, T’Mollek sat down on the lounge chair.

Eyeing her, Negan stripped off his shirt and placed it in the bag. Then he reached down, gently pushed her legs aside, and sat down next to her on the chair. He pulled a bottle of coconut oil out of the beach bag that sat on the sand between his feet.

“Oil me up?” he asked innocently.

T’Mollek looked down at him from above her sunglasses and below her sun hat. “You are perfectly capable.”

Negan grinned cockily and rubbed the oil on his arms. He indicated the tome under her arm. “I see you brought a little light reading.”

She glanced down at the medical textbook from the hospital. “I thought this book might offer some insight into the Algalonian anatomy. Seeing as the planet’s library network is not yet online.”

“Yeah, I’ll have to see if I can get the guys to move a little faster on that one,” he said. He turned to the side, and asked, “Get my back?”

T’Mollek leaned back a little, contemplating his gorgeous expanse of skin. “What is this for, exactly?” she asked.

“I gotta even out my tan,” he explained. “These farmer lines don’t work for me.”

Scrutinizing the darkness of his arms against the relative lightness of his chest, she agreed, “There is a degree of visual contrast.”

“Uh huh,” he said dryly. He cocked his head and said again, a bit more emphatically, “Get my back?”

T’Mollek realized she was stalling. _Where is the harm?_ she asked herself. She sat up, folding her legs beneath her. She carefully poured some oil into the palm of her hand and wiped it gently on the dry spots on his back where his hands couldn’t reach. The oil oozed between her fingers and down the backs of her hands. She looked up at him.

“My hands are all oily now,” she said.

Glancing back at the waves crashing against rocks along the beach, Negan grinned. “Too bad we don’t have any bodies of water around here to clean up in.”

T’Mollek glanced down at one of the towels he had brought along, then looked back at him with an eyebrow raised.

“You don’t expect me to get you a wet washcloth, do you?” he drawled as he sauntered barefoot toward the water, empty-handed.

T’Mollek looked down at her dripping hands and sighed. After a moment she stood up and obstinately followed him to the water.

Wading in the water, he glanced at her as she approached his side. He flashed his patented dimples, having gotten his way once again. She bent over and washed her hands in the waves, rubbing sand into them to remove the coconut oil residue. Once clean, she turned back to the umbrella and chair. As she did, he reached out and took her hand. She stopped short but did not turn to him.

There was a long silence and then he said quietly, “C’mon in. The water’s fine.”

Still avoiding his eyes, she took a step or two backward until she was facing him. She looked up into his face and his grin had softened to a gentle smile. He gave her a tiny nod of appreciation.

And then he ruined the moment by rapidly sliding the side of his foot through the water in her direction, soaking her from the waist down. She dropped his hand and splashed him back. He chased her out of the water and then back in, the waves lapping at their feet comfortably. Laughing, he ran into the water and dove into a wave. When he resurfaced and looked at her for approval, he saw her back as she returned to her chair beneath the umbrella where her medical text awaited.

Undeterred, Negan continued to swim as T’Mollek reclined on the lounge chair. The sound of the waves crashing against rocks, the warmth of the sun, and the endorphins that had been released during the playful encounter with Negan lulled her. Without realizing her eyes had closed, she allowed darkness and silence to enfold her.

When she opened her eyes again, Jaxon’s face was in hers. He was to her right, stroking her left cheek with his right hand. His beautiful, honey brown eyes looked down at her and she felt that the only logical thing to do in response to this was to kiss his sweet mouth. She put her right hand on the back of his head and pulled him down to her. She opened her lips slightly and found that they fit comfortably and naturally against his.

Then he abruptly slapped her across the face.

She opened her eyes from her dream, startled to find Negan kneeling next to her, gently tapping her cheek with his hand. It was dark, and she shivered as a cold wind blew.

“T’Mollek,” he said gravely. “Storm’s comin’. Gotta go batten down the hatches.”

They hurriedly packed their gear.

***

“What are the storms like on Algalon?” she asked as they hastened toward the compound.

“Not good,” he said tersely.

“Hurricanes?”

“Not since I’ve been here.”

“Where is Elgie?”

“In the house with Data. They’ll be fine. Del, too. Let’s get these animals to the barn.”

“Is that wise?” T’Mollek questioned as the dark clouds began a slightly cyclical rotation.

“The barn’s strong,” he said with a trace of doubt. But he wouldn’t have her contradict him.

The wind was fierce and tree limbs bent and broke. By the time they got the animals in, they were soaked to the skin and breathing hard. Negan stepped in toward T’Mollek, who was standing in the corner of the barn looking out the window.

“You’re trembling,” he said softly.

“I am merely experiencing an involuntary somatic motor response to the air temperature on my wet skin,” she said logically.

 _Yeah_ , Negan thought as he turned to pull a blanket off a shelf, _your wet skin is giving me an involuntary response, too._

Aloud, he said, “You’re cold. You should get out of those wet clothes.”

“I will as soon as I return to my quarters,” she said making her way for the door. Her teeth were chattering audibly, although she did not register discomfort on her face otherwise.

Negan, also shivering a bit, grinned as he unwrapped the blanket. “Not in this storm, you’re not,” he told her. “C’mere. Get under this with me.”

“No, thank you.”

“We both need some combined body heat,” he said.

“I am fine with my own, thank you.”

“Look,” he said reasonably. “If I don’t warm up, I’ll get sick. If I get sick, this place falls apart. I _need_ you. Be a doctor and come practice some preventive care over here.”

“Illness is not a result of lowered body tempera—“

Negan furrowed his eyebrows charmingly and wheedled with a half-grin. “T’Mollek. Riker told me you were to do everything I asked of you. I’m asking you to get under this blanket with me and keep me warm.” He cocked his head to the side. “Please?”

Watching Negan under the blanket and considering his request, T’Mollek had stopped shivering and was actually starting to feel quite warm. She whispered, “This is a slippery slope.”

He grinned in delighted agreement and moistened his bottom lip by gently running his teeth over it. “ _Very_ slippery.”

She stoically got under the blanket with him and he wrapped her up beside him. They sat in the corner of the barn while the hail rained down on the roof and against the windows. He leaned in to her and she stiffened, trying to maintain space between their bodies. Eventually, however, she relaxed as she felt the warmth of his body against hers. She felt his muscles through his shirt against her elbow.

Suddenly T’Mollek pulled away from him, giving him a sidelong look.

“What’s that for?” he asked, slightly indignant but amused.

“You smell like coconut oil,” she said distastefully.

“Well, what’s wrong with that?”

“I don’t like coconuts.”

“You don’t like coconuts? Say—”

She held up a hand to interrupt him. She cocked her head as though listening to something.

“What is it?” he asked. “I don’t hear—“

But then he did hear it. The sound of a freight train rapidly approaching. The whistling, roaring sound of the tornado was getting louder as the funnel cloud barreled toward the farm at a hundred kilometers per hour.

“Get down!” Negan shouted, buffering T’Mollek with his body and covering them both head to toe with the thick blanket. She felt him grip her arm with his strong hand and felt his chest covering her back, his chin in the back of her neck as he used his own head to shield hers.

It was the only time T’Mollek could recall ever being protected by anyone. This was no political ploy or emotional manipulation. He had covered her instinctively, without conscious thought, without regard to his own safety.

The roaring of the twister came to a climax, and the walls of the barn shook. The horse screamed and reared in his stall.

Then all at once, it was over. The funnel retreated back into the heavens from whence it had come. Negan and T’Mollek slowly stood up, shook the blanket off and checked themselves for injury. T’Mollek looked the horse in the eye and slowly approached him as Negan opened the doors. She was able to calm the animal in a relatively short amount of time, rubbing his head and whispering softly to him.

Then she joined Negan outside where they surveyed the damage. The twister had brushed just against the barn, removing the paint in a long swath, but it was miraculously unscathed otherwise. The house and garage were untouched. A wide section of the field was leveled but fortunately, most of it had just been planted, so they were only a month off schedule, and there was plenty of food stored and still growing. _Besides,_ T’Mollek reminded herself, _we’ll be long gone before the harvest anyway._

The late afternoon sun shone through a break in the clouds, creating long beams as though from a spotlight.

“Looks like God is reaching for us,” Negan said peacefully.

“Where?” T’Mollek asked, irritated, looking all around her. It was just like Q to lurk around causing trouble. He had probably created the storm to drive her into Negan’s arms. Why must he always interfere?

Negan chucked. “I didn’t mean literally. It’s just . . . the sunbeams coming through those clouds. . . .”

Relieved, T’Mollek looked up to where he was pointing. “Oh,” she said, puzzled. “In what way does that look like a god?”

“It’s just a metaphor. It’s comforting.”

“In what way?” she said again, even more dubiously.

“It’s just comforting to think of . . . someone looking down on us,” he said with a smile. “Watching over us.”

T’Mollek shook her head. “I don’t think that is comforting in the slightest.”

Negan smiled but his eyes were a little bit serious. “Why? What do you have to hide?”

“I merely find the notion of being under constant hidden surveillance to be, if anything, discomfiting.”

His grin reached his eyes now, as he believed he had stumbled on something. He nodded slightly and raised his eyebrows. “I think you’ve got somethin’ to hide.”

T’Mollek turned to him and said, very seriously, “Don’t we all?” And she turned and walked toward her tent.

Negan’s grin faded as he watched her go. He turned toward his house to check on Elgie and Data, but his eyes remained on her until she closed her door.


	8. Would the King Burn Guenevere?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tensions come to a head between Negan and T'Mollek, but she comes up with a possible solution to the mystery of the dying orphans.

T’Mollek had come to understand all too well the idiom “Be careful what you wish for.” She was almost constantly at Negan’s house but was kept so busy working, there was no chance to snoop in his office.

One afternoon, after a long morning of changing IVs and bedpans, she arrived to cook lunch only to find stacks of dishes completely covering the counter. She couldn’t wash them because the sink was full of more dishes. She couldn’t wash _them_ because the drying rack was full. She surveyed everything in the kitchen, calculated how much time she needed to do everything in the most efficient way possible, and undertook the task. It was something Negan liked to refer to as her “superpower.”

It was not a superpower, she countered; it was observation and efficiency.

The next evening she arrived to find the kitchen in exactly the same state.

“How do the two of you generate so many dirty dishes?” she asked but received no answer.

After cleaning the kitchen for the second afternoon in a row, she heard a loud noise from Elgie’s room, followed by a cry. She ran into the room and found that Elgie had tripped over a pile of toys. She spent the next several hours cleaning Elgie’s room with her. Whenever Elgie refused to pick up a toy, T’Mollek placed the toy into the large basket on top the dirty laundry.

“What do you appose you’re dunna do with those toys?” Elgie asked suspiciously.

“I suppose I am going to take these toys to the hospital for the children to play with when they get better,” T’Mollek said, knowing how territorial children were with their playthings.

“Dat’s not fair!” she said, grabbing her tiny naked doll from the top of the basket. It was about the size of T’Mollek’s hand. “You can’t take Nameless!”  
  
“You do not seem to have any respect or need for Nameless or any of these other toys, or you would have put them away where they belong,” T’Mollek explained logically and tossed a car into the basket.

Still clutching her beloved Nameless, Elgie ran to retrieve the car, a wooden snake, and a ball from the basket. “I aspect dese toys,” she muttered, putting them away in their appropriate drawers and shelves.

Once the laundry basket was emptied of toys, all of which were neatly put away where they belonged, T’Mollek said, “Well, I’m taking this basket of laundry across the street to the hospital to wash.”

“Why don’t you just wash them here in the basement?” Elgie asked.

T’Mollek gaped at the little girl. “You have a basement?”

“Yeah.”

“Is that where you and Data went during the storm?”

“Yes.”

“Can you show me where the basement door is?”

“I’m busy aspecting my toys,” Elgie said airily. “I’ll show you later.”

T’Mollek remained nonplussed but internally seethed that Negan had been making her lug the laundry across the road every time she had to wash it. “In the meantime, I will wash the laundry at the hospital,” she said. “I’ll be right back.” She eyed the now-sparkling clean room and raised a threatening eyebrow. “Do not destroy this room in the next ten minutes.”

She stepped out onto the porch with the basket and got halfway across the road when she realized she had forgotten to strip Elgie’s bed. She returned into the house and entered Elgie’s bedroom, wondering if she could somehow talk her way into Negan’s bedroom under the guise of changing the linens, when she stopped short.

Half of Elgie’s toys were scattered all over the floor and her bed.

T’Mollek dropped the basket. The walls were streaked with paint and scattered papers covered the floor. It was utter chaos.

Without thinking, T’Mollek, asked the air, “Q, are you—”

Elgie popped her head out from behind her easel, covered head to toe in paint. She wiped her hands on a towel and chortled, “Why are you saying letters?” Then she stopped and repeated, “Q-R-U! That’s funny!”

“What?” T’Mollek asked.

“Q-R-U doesn’t spell anysing!” She stopped to think. “Does it?”

T’Mollek pulled herself back together and stepped forward to reprimand the little girl, who was the face of perfect innocence.

“This room was literally spotless not two minutes ago.”

“I’m dest painteen,” she said, holding her arms out in a shrug.

Completely over it, T’Mollek simply said, “I give up,” and stalked out of the room.

Elgie called out to her, “I’m painteen dis for _you. . . .”_

T’Mollek walked briskly past Negan, who was just walking down the hall from his office. She opened the door and slammed it behind her in a completely uncharacteristic show of frustration.

“Excuse me. T’Mollek!” he opened the door and stepped out onto the porch.

T’Mollek stopped sharply and whipped around to face him.

The mildness of his grin didn’t mask the growl in his voice. “You forgot the laundry.”

With all the dignity of a world of Vulcans, T’Mollek retorted, “I did not ‘forget’ the laundry. Your laundry is not my responsibility. I have far more important work to do.”

“Clean laundry isn’t _important_?” Negan asked with the touch of the theatrical exaggeration he exhibited when he needed to throw his weight around. “You expect Elgie and me . . . Del . . . _all_ the sick little children . . . to wear _soiled clothing_? Why, that hardly seems sanitary!”

T’Mollek’s stomach went cold at his tone and the glint in his eyes, which seemed to be teetering on the brink of madness. But she stood her ground. “That is not why I was brought here,” she said. “I was to find a cure for these children, but I’ve been rendered useless. I spend more time in the field and the barn and _this house_ than I do in the hospital. I am a trained physician and a Starfleet officer—”

Sarcastically, he threw his arms out. “To be fair, you’re not much of either.”

“—and I am being forced into the positions of housewife and farmer.”

“You don’t think that’s an important job?”

“It’s a full time job,” she corrected. “Actually, two full time jobs, neither of which is the job I was trained and sent here to do—to cure these children.”

“I _know_ ,” he said, his sarcasm building. “You’re a _hero_. When your mission is over, I’ll recommend you for a fuckin’ commen _da_ tion!” He said the last word with a particularly bombastic emphasis, his voice growing deep and menacing.

“I do not _wish_ for a commendation!” she said automatically. Then after a beat, she added, “And I don’t think a civilian can even do that! I was not brought here to farm the land or feed the livestock or do _laundry_. I was brought here—”

His voice grew deathly quiet and he crept up to her with sudden sincerity. “You were brought here to _help_ these children. So help them. Care for them. Tend to them. Clean them and provide for them and let them know they're not alone in the world. Speak to them. Hold their hands. These aren't Vulcan children, Doctor, they’re human. They need human contact.” He looked at her in disappointment. “Maybe you're right. Maybe you are useless here.”

He stalked into the house and slammed the door as Del approached from the direction of the garage just north of the hospital. This was not the first time he had heard this conversation. Negan and Dr. Hall had had similar ones before she got sick.

Thoroughly frustrated, T’Mollek stormed into the hospital with Del following behind her. She went straight to the lab and picked up a slide to inspect for the millionth time. Her hand shook with fury and she dropped it onto the floor. It shattered.

“Damn it,” she muttered and crouched to pick up the pieces.

“Are you all right, Doctor?” Del asked in his meek way.

“I am—” She started to say “fine,” but stopped herself short. “Not sure,” she finished, standing.

“You’re doing outstanding work here, Doctor,” he reassured her. “But when do you sleep?”

“I will sleep when the children are cured,” she said firmly. “Until then, there are too many . . . domestic chores to complete.”

“Doctor,” he said gently, “when was the last time you slept?”

She paused to reflect. “I think it was before we planted the fall crops.”

“That was a month ago!” he exclaimed.

“Three weeks and two days, to be precise.”

“Even for a Vulcan, that can't be healthy,” he said, shaking his head.

“No,” she admitted, “it is not.”

“Doctor . . . T’Mollek. You need to get some sleep. You're slowing down, you’re . . .” he chuckled kindly. “Dropping things. You'll start making mistakes.”

“I have made so many mistakes since I’ve been here,” she said quietly, crouching again to clean the pieces of broken glass. She cut herself on a piece and watched the green blood ooze out of her hand.

Del crouched beside her, taking her hand in his. “You aren't helping anyone this way. These kids need you healthy and well-rested.”

She sighed and admitted he was right. She asked if he could wash the linens and prepare the evening’s IVs while she cleaned her wound and turned in for the night. He, of course, readily agreed.

***

T’Mollek was actually grateful for the fight with Negan and the cut on her hand, as it gave her the excuse she hadn’t allowed herself to take to her bed for a few hours.

The small cot she slept on was hard and uneven and barely wide enough to fit her small frame. But the pillow was stuffed with soft cotton and it conformed well to her head and neck. She crawled underneath the sheets, lay her head on the pillow, and felt the darkness wash over her body like warm sea water on a hot day.

Her mind refused to turn off, however, even in her dreams, and the image of an elaborate round banquet table filled her mind. She was seated next to Q, and they were surrounded by platters of toy food and carafes of unknown liquid. Q’s hair was styled short with wisps of hair framing his forehead. He wore chain-mail. T’Mollek wore a tall golden crown and a long dress with an ermine-lined collar.

“What’s wrong, Jenny?” Q asked her in a hushed tone and an accent similar to Captain Picard’s.

“I have failed, my love,” she answered in the same accent. “It is not viral, nor bacterial, nor parasitic, nor poisonous. There are no detectable anomalies. I have killed my crew. I must return to the _Enterprise_ in shame, my mission unfulfilled.”

“If you had to take a guess, what would you say is the most logical explanation?”

“Vulcans don't gue—”

“If you _had_ to,” he interrupted.

She sighed. “Based on their symptoms and the length of time they have been ill without deteriorating . . . I would say asteria poisoning. But there is no asteria on this planet. And there is nothing native to this planet that could cause these symptoms.”

“Even when all logic points against it: sometimes you just have to go with your gut.”

“My gut?” she asked.

“That’s what simple folk do.”

He handed her a golden goblet, picking one up himself. They interlinked arms and drank a wedding toast.


	9. Fight Like Twenty Armies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan and T'Mollek's relationship reaches a new and unexpected level.

T’Mollek woke up very refreshed from the best night of sleep she’d had since arriving on Algalon—possibly since arriving on the _Enterprise_.

T’Mollek rose, made her bed, brushed her hair and her teeth, and got dressed.

There was a knock at the door and she opened it.

It was Negan.

“This is from Elgie,” he said, handing her a piece of paper and trying to look nonchalant. “She’d like to invite you to dinner this evening.”

“She would like to invite me to _cook_ dinner, you mean.”

“No,” he said, his brown, hangdog eyes looking at her with sincerity. “ _I_ will be cooking. Elgie will be helping. She insisted.”

T’Mollek drew herself up regally. “I accept her kind invitation.

“Six o’clock,” he said rather stiffly. “I’ll look up a recipe for . . . chickpeas or somethin’.”

A smile played at the corner of her mouth. “I appreciate that.”

“Well,” Negan said. “I’m sure you want to get on with your work at the hospital. I’ll leave you to it.”

T’Mollek closed the door behind him and looked down at the paper. It was Elgie’s completed painting: a stick figure T’Mollek with a bright mass of wild red curls, a shorter figure of Elgie with wild black curls, and a tall, imposing stick figure with short dark hair and a neatly trimmed beard. The taller figures were holding hands with the shorter, and their outside arms were stretched across to hold each other’s hands. All three were encircled by a wreath of red hearts.

***

T’Mollek’s duty roster was surprisingly light on domestic chores that morning. She smile inwardly. She would be spending the entire day in the lab.

She pulled the miyo root out of her pocket. _Even if all logic points against it_ . . . she thought.

She had brought the small grinder Data had made for her to the lab to grind analgesic tablets for Doston’s IV. He had been strengthening over the past few days and had complained of headaches. Using the machine, T’Mollek added ground miyo root as well. She concocted a simple remedy for asteria poisoning, all the while shamelessly whistling a jaunty show tune.

As she attached the bottle to the needle in his arm, she addressed the sleeping eight-year-old.

“I’m administering a combination of miyo root and analgesic,” she said softly. “Together, they serve as an antidote for asteria poisoning. I don’t know how you might have come into contact with asteria, and I fully realize there is no trace of asteria in your tissues or fluids. But attempting a cure is preferable to inaction. This won’t harm you. It is quite probable that it won’t help you, either, but . . . nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

Within two hours, his pallor had improved and his breathing became less labored.

She left his bedside feeling light and optimistic for the first time since her arrival.

***

T’Mollek appeared on Negan’s doorstep for dinner as scheduled. She brought with her a surprise.

“I was able to harvest some cocoa beans,” she said, handing them to him in a covered basket. “I think I have enough to make some chocolate for you and Elgie.”

“I’m not much of a chocolate person,” he said uncertainly, a kitchen towel draped over his shoulder.  
  
“Neither am I,” she replied, undeterred. “But I believe Elgie might enjoy it.”

“I don’t know,” he said, letting her in. “Too much sugar makes her a little wild.”

“Is she in her room?”

“Yeah, she’s been in there singing all afternoon,” Negan said ruefully. “Go see if you can get her to play a quiet game.”

“I happen to like Elgie’s singing,” she said breezily as she walked past him and into the little girl’s room. As she passed the kitchen, she noted with some satisfaction that Negan had a sink full of dishes soaking in soapy water.

As Negan completed the domestic chore he typically reserved for the doctor, T’Mollek and Elgie staged a musical production of “Through the Looking-Glass,” making up a melody to the Tweedledum and Tweeledee song and improvising a dance.

Elgie began the second stanza, “Just as the monstrous crow was about to fly in,” when Negan entered the room unexpectedly, flapping his long arms and cawing loudly, causing Elgie to squeal and giggle with startled delight. He scooped her up into his arms and gave her a kiss on each cheek. She threw her arms around his neck, and as casually as if he’d been doing it for years, he put his arm around T’Mollek’s waist.

Caught up in the moment and without truly thinking about what she was doing, T’Mollek’s arm went around his waist. The feeling of his taut muscles beneath his shirt was what brought her down to earth with a thud that matched the beating of her heart.

On Nimbus III, it is called an abduction alliance. On Earth, they call it Stockholm Syndrome or capture-bonding. T’Mollek refused to believe this was what was happening to her. She was not Negan’s prisoner. She would be leaving here in just over a month. And hadn’t T’Sharr ordered her to gain Negan’s trust? To lull him into a false sense of security so she could achieve her terrible goal?

T’Mollek’s thumb gave Negan’s obliques a quick brush to feel the contours and she sighed shakily. He looked down at her and smiled with equal satisfaction.

From a distance, they looked like a family—minus the circle of red hearts.

Negan snagged a little piece of fuzz from her short hair, which now accentuated her beautiful pointed ears. His thumb lingered as he gently brushed the side of her ear. She quivered and looked up at him, startled. He was smiling contentedly down at her. She looked away, her face flushed—but she did not move her arm.

“I found a recipe for chickpea soufflé,” Negan said finally, breaking the contact. “Is an hour too long to wait?”

“Actually,” T’Mollek said, “I was thinking . . . fried chicken?”

Negan and Elgie gape at her in open-mouthed shock.

“What did we do to earn such a _treat_?” Negan wondered.

“I think we have something to celebrate,” she said. “Go invite Del and Data as well.”

Negan gave her a questioning look, but he and Elgie went out to the garage to invite the scientists to dinner with them.

***

An hour later, T’Mollek met Data and Del at the door. “Mr. Data, I know that you do not eat food,” she said, “but I wanted us all to be together. We have cause to celebrate.”

“What are we celebrating?” Negan asked in bemusement from the kitchen.

“Come in, everyone, and I’ll tell you.”

They filed into the tiny kitchen as Elgie walked in, asking, “What’s that great smell?”

“That, my dear, is the fried chicken dinner we were promised!” Negan said with a bright smile.

“Well, what are waiting for?” Elgie asked. “When are we dunna eat that chicken?”

Everyone but Data and Elgie laughed as they sat down to eat.

After a few minutes of silent rapture, Del managed, “This is . . . transcendental.”

“Data, I’m sorry you’re not human,” Negan said, his mouth full. “This chicken is so good, it would make you cry.”

“I was not aware that the eating of food could bring about such a strong emotional response,” Data said.

“When it’s this good, it can,” Negan asserted.

“Where did a Vulcan learn to cook chicken like this?” Del asked curiously.

“I adapted my grandmother’s recipe,” she explained. “The herbs and spices from our garden here are not quite what she had access to, but I made due.”

“Now that we know the full extent of your culinary prowess,” Negan said with a chuckle, “we may never let you out of the kitchen.”

T’Mollek smiled uncomfortably.

“Doctor, you had mentioned that this was a celebratory meal,” Data said. “May I ask what we are celebrating?”

“Yes, do tell!” Del said in anticipation.

“Is Bessie dunna have another cow baby?” Elgie guessed.

“No, Elgie,” T’Mollek answered. “Even better. I believe I may have found a cure for the children.”

As that sank in, Negan took a deep breath. “Really!”

“I decided to treat the illness as asteria poisoning,” she said.

“But, Doctor,” Del said, “we discussed this. There is no asteria on this planet. Never has, never was.”

“So it would appear,” she said, having expected more enthusiasm over this news that she had been bursting to share all day. “However, after ruling everything else out, I concluded that there must have been some inadvertent contamination from the _Infinity_.”

Negan set his fork down, trying to break this to her gently. “But there were no traces of asteria poisoning in any of the patients.”

“Yes, but I could not help feeling that I was overlooking something. Perhaps the cells have mutated or perhaps I haven’t been preparing the slides correctly or reading them correctly, and I simply missed the asteria.”

“Naw, naw, naw,” Negan said contradicting her. “You can read a slide, you’re an expert researcher. You shouldn’t second guess yourself.”

Quietly and surprised by the compliment, T’Mollek thanked him for his confidence in her.

“And you have reason to believe the cure will work?” Del asked with a small smile, trying to give T’Mollek her moment.

She turned to face him, regaining some of her enthusiasm. “When I left Doston this afternoon, his vital signs had shown marked improvement. And what’s more . . . he spoke.”

“He what?” Negan said, trying to keep the emotion out of his voice.

“He _spoke,_ ” T’Mollek repeated with a smile.

Negan put a hand to his mouth and ran it down his beard, his eyes becoming misty.

“He was conscious?” Del asked breathlessly.

“I believe so. He was quite weak, but he whispered, ‘Where am I?’ I took his hand and he squeezed mine back. Then he seemed to smile before falling back to sleep. The effort had exhausted him, but I believe that the poison is slowly leaving his system.”

“Did you administer this cure to the other children?” Data asked.

“Not yet,” she told him. “Doston is the strongest of the children, and I wanted to try it with him first.”

She showed him the video feed from the hospital, training the focus on Doston, who lay on his bed sleeping easily.

Tears came to Negan’s eyes finally as he accepted this news. “Well, Doctor O’Reilly. That _is_ a reason to celebrate. I assume you’ll be going back to check on him after dinner?”

She nodded.

“Congratulations, Doctor,” Data said. “Your ability to solve this riddle with limited technology has been remarkable.”

Negan held up his glass. “To Dr. O’Reilly, for persevering even when it looked like all hope was gone.” He voice cracked and he cleared his throat. “Cheers!”

They toasted her and for the first time in over a year, T’Mollek smiled with pride over her own accomplishment.

After dinner, T’Mollek and Negan washed dishes in the kitchen while Data sat in the living room entertaining Elgie. Del had called it an early night and retired to his tent. T’Mollek noticed a flicker on her video monitor.

“Doston’s moving,” she said, handing it to Negan.

“Well, let’s go,” Negan said, grabbing a bottle of water from the mini-fridge in the kitchen. “Data, could you stay with Elgie?”

“Certainly.”

“Yayy!” Elgie cheered. “Can you pick me up by my ankles and swing me around again?”

In unison, Negan and T’Mollek admonished, “No swinging by the ankles!” as they went out the door.

“Oh, maaaan!” Elgie whined.

***

Doston opened his eyes and looked up at the red-haired woman who was checking his lungs with a stethoscope. “Who are you?” Doston asked weakly as his eyes focused.

“My name is Dr. T’Mollek O’Reilly. I was sent here by Starfleet to help you and your friends get better.”

“I think I remember that,” he said. “Where’s Jaxon?”

“I’m here, son.” Negan took the boy’s hand, his chin trembling with emotion. He wiped tears from his eyes but remained strong for him.

“How do you feel?” T’Mollek asked gently.

“Thirsty” he said a bit hoarsely.

“One moment.” She poured him a cup of water from the tap. She helped him sit up and take a sip. He coughed and made a face.

“That’s terrible. It tastes like worms.”

“Of course. I’ll get you a bottle of filtered water.”

“No. Here. I brought one,” said Negan. He opened the bottle and helped the boy drink. “Doctor, you should go to bed. You look like you haven’t slept in weeks.”

“I slept just last night,” she said defensively.                    

Negan smiled at that. “Why don’t you put Elgie to bed and you can sleep on the couch. I’ll stay up with Doston.” He turned to the boy and took his hand again. “We have some catching up to do.”

“Well . . .”

“If he takes a turn, we’ll call for you.”

“I feel that I should stay with my patient to monitor his vital signs,” she said.

“You’re having a lot of ‘feelings’ for a Vulcan, aren’t you?” he asked with a slight edge.

She flushed.

“Sorry,” he said, shaking his head. “That’s the emotion talking. Go. Sleep. We’ll be fine. Doston, won’t we be fine?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then in the morning you can fix up a cure for the rest of the children.”

“Very well,” she said, standing to go.

“Dr. O’Reilly?” the boy said.

“Yes, Doston?”

“Thank you.”

T’Mollek smiled and glanced at Negan, who had put his hand over his own face to hide his emotion.

“You’re welcome.”

***

T’Mollek dismissed Data and helped Elgie get ready for bed. While the little girl was putting on her pajamas, T’Mollek took a short stroll down the creaky hall. She reached a hand out to the doorknob.

“That's Dzaxon's room,” Elgie said officiously from the hallway. “ _My_ bafroom is this way.”

T’Mollek silently followed.

T’Mollek watched Elgie as she brushed her teeth, giving her some helpful pointers from a medical perspective. Afterward T’Mollek tucked her into bed. She turned to leave but Elgie’s voice drifted out from beneath her covers. “I’m too esscited to sleep.”

This seemed logical to T’Mollek, given the circumstances of the evening, up to and including the fried chicken dinner and being swung from the ankles by Starfleet’s only android. She asked her what she proposed to do until she felt able to fall asleep.

“Play ‘Cows and Monkeys and Nameless Goes to the Planet to Cure the Children and Comed Home with Chocolate Fried Chickens!’” she cried.

“Very well,” T’Mollek said. “You will have to teach me the rules.”

Elgie clambered out of bed and gathered several toys from her shelf of drawers. “There isn’t any rules,” she said. “You just _play_.”

“Ah. A ‘make-believe’ game.”

“Yes!”

They sat on the floor with a pile of animal figures, a toy star ship, a train, and of course, the naked doll Nameless. Elgie directed the story, which involved, much as she had earlier described, a monkey and a cow flying to another planet. However, the monkey and the cow could not agree on the right course, so Nameless ordered the monkey to leave the star ship and instead drive the train to a mountain where it set up camp and had a “pitnit,” leaving the cow to do the heavy lifting in space. The cow abandoned the mission to help the children in favor of re-enacting the poem “Jabberwocky” to an appreciative audience of stuffed animals.

The illogic nearly brought T’Mollek to her figurative knees. “When do the chocolate fried chickens come in?” T’Mollek asked helplessly. “This game makes little to no sense.”

“I know!” said Elgie proudly.

“Why are we doing this?”

“Because it's fun!”

“This is _not_ what I consider to be—”

She stopped herself. She was echoing Q’s words to her when she described how she spent her own leisure time. This was the third time she had thought of Q since she had been here, and she suddenly wished she could see him and tell him about how she had solved the medical mystery without any help from him or anyone else.

“Never mind,” T’Mollek said. “It's late. We can continue this nonsensical storyline in the morning.”

“Will you lay down next to me?”

“I will lie down next to you just until you fall asleep. Get under the covers.”

T’Mollek lay on top of the covers, facing the little girl. Elgie’s breathing became even. T’Mollek was just about to get up when a heavy wind blew loudly and shook the house.

Elgie stirred and asked, “Was that a tornado?”

“No. It was only the wind.”

“OK.”

Elgie reached up a little hand and smoothed T’Molleks’ curls away from her face and whispered sweetly, “There, there. Hush now. No need to be afraid.”

Implacably, T’Mollek whispered, “I am not afraid.”

In full voice, Elgie reprimanded her. “That's what Dzaxon says when I can't sleep.”

“I haven't tried to sleep yet.”

“You feel like you can't sleep,” Elgie said thoughtfully. “You feel too loud.”

“That is because you are touching my head and feeling my thoughts,” T’Mollek said.

Elgie sat straight up in bed. “I'm doing _what_?”

“I am a Vulcan,” she explained. “We have the ability to share thoughts by touching one another.”

“I want to share your thoughts more,” Elgie said, reaching her hand toward T’Mollek’s head.

T’Mollek pulled away slightly and stopped her hands with hers. “No, Elgie. It is not considered polite. It is a very private thing. You respect your own thoughts, and you must respect the thoughts of others.”

“That’s mean,” Elgie said, pouting sulkily and crossing her arms in front of her dramatically.

“No,” T’Mollek answered calmly, “that’s respect. Now, close your eyes and fall asleep.”

The child sighed heavily. “Fiiiine!”

She nestled back into her blankets and closed her eyes exaggeratedly tight. Then she opened them again to see if T’Mollek was watching her. (She was). She made a series of silly faces and grinned. Silently, T’Mollek lightly ran her fingers down Elgie’s nose and brushed lightly against her eyelids, gently forcing them to close. She continued to gently stroke her eyebrows and nose, then her hair and temples, putting soothing, sleepytime thoughts into her head. Soon Elgie was snoring lightly. T’Mollek, likewise soothed by this, also dozed.

***

A loud noise woke Elgie and T’Mollek, who nearly fell off the edge of Elgie’s bed. The door had slammed open and Negan was stomping through the house.

“What did you give him? _What did you give him_?” he bellowed.

T’Mollek rushed out of the bedroom, closing Elgie’s door behind her. The hallway light was still on and she nearly gasped when she saw Negan. He was sweating profusely. His white shirt and his red, tear-streaked face were covered in blood and dirt.

“A mixture of miyo root, ginger, and rosemary,” T’Mollek said, wondering if this was a dream.

“What was that, to counteract the non-existent ‘asteria poisoning’ that he didn’t have? You've fucking killed him.”

This had to be a dream.

“Excuse me?”

“Doston is dead. He’s fucking _dead_. About an hour ago, he had a seizure and started vomiting blood. His airways closed and he stopped breathing. That shit you gave him killed him.”

“But . . . that's . . . I have never known those herbs to cause such a reaction.”

“Maybe not on a human,” Negan spat. “But the Algalonian biochemistry probably isn’t the fucking same, is it? What happened to not randomly trying out solutions at the risk of poisoning the children?”

“Stop talking,” Elgie screamed from the doorway of her room, her face screwed up in tears. “Everyone stop talking! Everyone just go to sleep and be peaceful! P’eeeease!”

Negan tearfully flung a bloody sheet at T’Mollek, spittle flying. “You’re a fucking worthless idiot. You should have died in that crash. Fuck you!” His large fists were shaking and clenched in fury.

T’Mollek was beyond fight or flight. She wanted him to kill her.

“I am so sorry,” she said faintly. Then, as Negan turned his back on her, she began to think more clinically. “I need to see him. I need to perform an autopsy. To see where I went wrong.”

Was the miyo root she found hidden in the grain sack tainted?

“You are _finished_ touching these children.” He picked up the sobbing Elgie and tried in vain to comfort her with sweet whispers of apology in her ear. She wearily put her tiny arms around his neck and rested her head on his shoulder and he stroked her hair. He turned back to T’Mollek, his eyes black with hatred. “You stay outta that fuckin’ hospital. _Never_ again.”

“Please. If Doston had an allergic reaction, this may have been an anomaly. Let me perform an autopsy and determine what happened to him. I can determine if this was unique to Doston’s body chemistry or if the Algalonian—”

“I already buried him.”

“He must be exhumed—”

“Under _no_ circumstances is that to happen,” he hissed. “His religion demands that the dead be buried immediately. The body is not to be touched or mutilated. Do you understand me?”

“But . . . how can I do my job if I am not allowed—”

Negan abruptly put a hand up to stop her. He drew up dangerously close to T’Mollek. His eyes narrowed. “What’s the penalty for disobeying the Prime Directive, huh? That’s Starfleet’s non-interference law, isn’t it? What’s the penalty?”

“Court-martial,” she replied unsteadily. “Dishonorable discharge. Possible incarceration.”

“Not death?”                                                                          

“No,” she said, her body growing cold. “But the Prime Directive doesn’t apply here.”

He ignored her. “Well, _guess_ what the penalty for dishonoring religious beliefs is here on _Algalon_?” he asked, his voice rising, becoming increasingly manic.

She cleared her throat.

“Didn’t hear that,” he said, putting his hand to his ear. “Wait, did you say ‘death’? Because guess what, sister, that’s the _law_ here. Didn’t know that, did ya? And guess who makes, enforces, and carries out that law around here?”

She stared at the floor.

He took a deep breath and opened his mouth to continue but closed it again. “Get out,” he said quietly, the spirit suddenly gone from him. “Just get out.”

T’Mollek stumbled out of the house and wandered down the road in the moonlight, distraught. She reached the cemetery bordering the woods to the west of their compound. The graves of hundreds of Algalonian adults who had died before the _Infinity_ ’s arrival, the children who had died after their arrival, Dr. Hall, T’Mollek’s three crew members. And now little Doston. Grass was growing over the mounds of earth under which lay those who had died months ago. The flat ground over Doston’s fresh grave barely left a lump of earth displaced by his tiny, frail body. The dirt was still loose, and it was all T’Mollek could do not to dig him out with her bare hands. It was true that Starfleet’s Prime Directive of noninterference into the beliefs and cultures of other peoples prohibited her from acting contrary to their burial rites, no matter how ridiculous and inconsequential they might seem to outworlders.

She heard a strange sound as if an animal were in distress. She looked up into the woods to determine where the sound was coming from and realized it was coming from her. This was the first time she had been to the cemetery—and indeed to any cemetery—since her parents’ funeral.

She fell to her knees, keening helplessly.

Then gentle hands were on her shoulders, holding her close.

Del was whispering, “Shh, shh. It’s all right.”

She calmed herself and sat down cross-legged on the ground. He sat next to her.

“I killed him.”

“You didn’t kill him,” Del said, gently but firmly. “You took a chance and it didn’t have the desired result.”

“I gambled on a boy’s life. I was so sure it was asteria. In spite of all evidence to the contrary. I allowed myself to be swayed by . . .” She stopped herself. Q had talked her into trying this cure.

“Swayed by what?” Del asked. “Conjecture?”

“Worse,” she said, quietly furious.

“Hope?”

“A dream.”

“Many problems can be solved by the subconscious in dreams,” he said. “Your mind pulled all of your knowledge and experience together and developed a most logical-sounding solution.”

“My logic failed. I’m barred from the hospital. I cannot even keep them comfortable until the _Enterprise_ returns in a month. I must concede defeat.”

“You haven’t been defeated,” he said emphatically. “You have done so much good here. Elgie was a wild child before you arrived. She is learning so much from you. Discipline, courage. Her vocabulary is unbelievable! And she’s reading now. And singing! She’s sweet, she’s funny. That’s all because of you and your influence.”

“But that wasn’t my mission.”

“Forget your mission. You’ve turned that child’s life around. Jaxon couldn’t have done that on his own.”

“Starfleet did not send me here to teach one spoiled child discipline. I was supposed to save lives. Instead, a boy has died at my hands. Not to mention my crew—” She looked up at him in horrified realization. “They were right. All along. I truly am a failure. At everything.”

Del reached for her again, but she stood and walked away toward her tent in silence.


	10. Month 3: Age of Aquarius

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan needs a haircut.

Life went on at the compound. The air became crisp and the leaves on the trees began to change color. T’Mollek’s duty roster included nothing but farm work. Her hospital key was taken from her and she was not invited back into Negan’s house. She went days without any contact with a sentient being.

Early one morning, a week after Doston’s death, there was a knock on the door of her tent. It was T’Mollek’s day off and she was sitting on her cot, reading a book about Algalonian history. She opened the door and saw Elgie, pouting her lips and slouching in dramatic fashion.

“I dot stunged again. On my heel.”

“Let me see,” T’Mollek said. Elgie held up her foot as T’Mollek hunkered down. “You have a little sting mark on your ankle.”

“Noooo,” Elgie corrected in irritation. “My _heel_.”

“ _This_ is your ankle.”

“No, it’s not!” she snarled.

“You are forgetting that I am a trained medical professional,” T’Mollek said calmly. “This anatomical feature is your _ankle_.”

Elgie crossed her arms in front of her, scowling. “I aspeckably disagree.”

T’Mollek absorbed that with satisfaction. “I accept that.”

“This conversation is _boring_ ,” Elgie said petulantly.

“That is as may be, but regardless, I don’t believe Jaxon wants you to be here.”

“He’s not even paying any attention to me. Play with me.”

“You need to ask Jaxon first. He is not happy with me.”

Elgie, frustrated, dragged the reluctant T’Mollek by the hand to the house. When they climbed the porch steps and reached the door, Elgie stood expectantly. T’Mollek obediently knocked on the door. Negan opened the door, looked down at her with desperately sad, lonely brown eyes. T’Mollek felt a flash of warmth and desired only to comfort him.

She shook it off.

“Elgie wants to play with me,” she said simply.

Negan looked at her deeply, searching her eyes. They were as sad and defeated as his own. He silently took a step back, letting them both into the house, not taking his eyes off T’Mollek. It was an unspoken détente.

“Come to my room,” Elgie said, as if the events of the previous week had never taken place. “I want to make you a new painteen!”

They went into her room and sat cross-legged on the floor.

“Before we do anything,” said T’Mollek, “your hair needs brushing.” She picked up a hairbrush and went to work.

“Ouch!” Elgie shrieked.

“This is what comes of letting your hair grow long and loose. You would be better off with a short, sensible haircut. Then you could run as free as you please with little worries of tangles.”

“You’re making me sad!”

“That is not logical.”

“What’s ‘logical’ mean?”

“Logical means something that makes sense. I am not making you feel any emotion, nor is any person capable of making another feel any emotion. You are choosing to feel emotion based on the outcome of my actions or my words. The consequences of improper hair care themselves likewise cannot elicit sadness, nor joy. For such consequences to elicit any emotion at all is not logical.”

She thought once more of Q and how convinced she had been that he had been making her feel emotions for him. She scoffed quietly and muttered, “Look who’s talking.”

Elgie turned around and gave T’Mollek a look of amused disbelief. “ _You’re_ talking!” she chuckled.

T’Mollek smiled, slightly abashed. “I was speaking rhetorically.”

“What’s a tora-klee?”

“Rhe-torically means that I said something but I did not expect a response.”

Elgie cocked her head in amused protestation. “But T’Mollek . . . dat’s not logical!”

Negan, who had been watching this with amusement from the doorway, now entered. “Contrariwise,' continued Tweedledee, 'if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. _That's_ logic.’”

T’Mollek, amused and a bit surprised by this display, murmured, “Curiouser and curiouser . . .”

Not to be outdone, Elgie got in on the _Wonderland_ action. “Eat me!” she cried.

Negan leaned down to her, put his face in her neck, lightly tickling her with his beard. “Om nom nom nom!”

Elgie squealed and giggled with delight. Negan shot T’Mollek a conspiratorial crooked half-grin. She returned his smile, then flushed with embarrassment and looked away quickly. She felt a similar lightheaded rush she used to feel with Q—but also one lower in her body.

Smoothly, not taking his eyes off T’Mollek, he said, “I’m goin’ out to feed the livestock. You two girls have fun.”

He left and T’Mollek turned her attention to Elgie. Well, not her full attention. She found herself vaguely distracted.

***

Time marched on. Over the next week, things gradually went back to how they had been, save T’Mollek’s time in the hospital. In passing, she inquired about the children’s wellbeing and Negan only answered, “No change.” The consensus seemed to be to wait out the next few weeks until the _Enterprise_ returned.

T’Mollek spent more time on farm work. It wreaked havoc on her uniform, which was not built to withstand such consistently strenuous activity. One morning, her sleeve caught and tore on a sharp, exposed fence wire around the pig pen, leaving her right forearm exposed. _My you-da-fur_ , she thought with a chuckle, remembering the rock-like Blotorkians on her second away mission from the _Enterprise_. Their language was so different from Federation Standard that the universal translator mistook “uniform” for “you-da-fur.” They thought her clothing was her fur and that removing it meant they were skinning her alive.

It had only been a year ago, but it felt like an eternity.

Her duties also took her more and more often to Negan’s house, and he would silently her in, a cocky little twinkle in his eye as she passed.

She took the opportunity to make Elgie a small gift. She washed the blue fabric of her torn uniform sleeve, cut it, and sewed it into a tiny blue uniform to fit Elgie’s favorite doll, Nameless.

Elgie gasped when she saw it. “Nameless!” she said breathlessly. “You becomed a do’tor!”

Nameless was henceforth known as “Dr. Nameless.”

***

“Are you ready for a haircut yet?” T’Mollek asked Elgie one morning as they sat on the couch in the living room reading books.

“Not _dest_ yet,” she replied, vaguely, her eyes never leaving her book.

“You’ll feel better without all that hair in your eyes,” she promised.

“I like my hair in my eyes.”

“I can’t even _see_ your eyes” Negan put in. “What color are they? Yellow?”

“No!” Elgie laughed. “Dat’s Data with the yellow eyes.”

“Are they . . . green?”

“No, dat’s Del’s eyes!”

“Are they . . .” He turned very suddenly and fixed his gaze solely on T’Mollek. “Baby blue?”

Elgie’s smile left her face as she looked back and forth at them, realizing this was no longer about her. “No,” she said, trying to reassert her position in the conversation. “They’re honey-colored brown! Like your eyes!”

“They certainly are, Elgie,” T’Mollek said, giving Negan a significant look. She had long seen a resemblance. “Although one has to look past your unruly locks to notice them.”

Negan ran his fingers through his own hair. “Speaking of unruly locks . . .”

T’Mollek looked at him and an idea struck her. “Elgie. Do you think Jaxon needs a haircut?”

“I do, indeed,” Elgie asserted.

Negan stifled a smirk at her T’Mollek-esque word choice.

“As do I,” T’Mollek agreed in the same tone. “I would like to propose a deal. If I let you help cut Jaxon’s hair, could he help me cut yours?”

“Well . . .” Elgie said, very thoughtfully, her finger to her chin and tilting her head with a frown. “I think it would be a better deal if I cut Dzaxon’s hair . . . and you let me not get my hair cut at all.”

“That is not the deal I am proposing. Jaxon, could you please bring me a scissors and a towel? I, and I alone, will be cutting your hair.”

“But that’s not fair!” Elgie protested, hurt.

“That is _exactly_ fair. Run along and play.” She made a dismissive gesture with her hand and turned her back on Elgie.

“But I want to help!”

“You may,” T’Mollek said. “And afterward, he will help me cut yours. Just a trim.”

“No!” Elgie shouted. She caught herself, and amended this more calmly. “I speckfully disagree.”

Negan raised his eyebrows and looked back and forth from Elgie to T’Mollek.

“Very well,” T’Mollek turned to Negan, who had brought the items she had requested.

“You’re mean!” Elgie accused.

“If that is your assessment . . .” T’Mollek said, her back to Elgie. She moved a chair to the center of the room and indicated that Negan should sit there. She placed the towel around his neck.

“I didn’t want to help cut Dzaxon’s hair anyway,” Elgie said sulkily and stomped out of the room.

Quietly, T’Mollek muttered, “She really does _not_ want her hair cut.”

“Her mother had long hair,” he explained quietly. “She’s afraid if she gets it cut, she won’t look like her anymore.”

“I see. The emotions of a four-year-old are difficult to overcome.”

“Yes, they are,” Negan said. After a pause, he asked, “So, Doctor, how’re we doin’ this?”

“Doing . . .?”

“My haircut. Usually I get a shampoo and a massage.”

“Oh,” she said, her heart thumping at the thought of massaging Negan’s scalp and shoulders. “Well. I . . . suppose now that my gambit has proven a failure, this exercise is quite unnecessary.” She handed the scissors back, handle toward him.

He smirked and stood up. “Well. I suppose now that you’ve gotten me primed for my first haircut in months, to not follow through would be . . . pretty mean.”

“That seems to be the general consensus,” she said, a twinkle in her eye. “However, if you are _asking_ me for a haircut . . .”

“Oh, so I gotta ask, do I?” he drawled, walking slowly toward her.

Not sure what to make of this, T’Mollek answered: “Uh . . .”

Very close to her, he looked down at her, teasingly. “Please?”

“Of . . .” She cleared her throat. “Course. Your, uh, beard could use a trim as well.”

“C’mon,” he said quietly and led her through his office, which was unlocked, and into his bedroom.

_Fight of flight? No . . . another word that begins with “F.”_

Her eyes quickly scanned the room. He put a hand on her shoulder and steered her to the right, into a private bathroom.

“You should probably give me a shampoo and massage before the cut,” he said. “That’s how it’s done.”

“You don’t appear to have a barber’s chair in this room,” she observed.

“I do not,” he agreed. “But I do have a nice big bathtub.”

Her mouth had gone dry. “So you do.”

“How about this? I strip down— _to my shorts­—_ and get in the tub. It’s not exactly the usual protocol for a shave and a haircut, but . . . we can improvise.”

“You could simply wash your hair yourself and then allow me to cut it,” she said reasonably.

“Yeah,” he admitted with a half-grin, “but I kinda want the whole experience.”

“The _Enterprise_ will return in only three weeks’ time,” she said, needing a sip of water. “There is a well-respected barber on board—a Bolian named Mot. I have heard that he is the best barber in Starfleet. I am quite certain he will give you the experience you desire.”

She resolutely hand the scissors to Negan with some finality and walked out.

He watched her go, hearing her footsteps creak across the floor, out of his room, and down the hall. He sighed. “I’m quite certain he will _not_. . . .”

***

T’Mollek and Negan spent the next few days crossing paths only briefly in the field or in the barn, but he did not assign her any household duties. She found herself looking at the house and wondering what was going on in there, how Elgie was doing, and what shape that kitchen was in.

She stopped in to the garage to inquire as to the progress Data and Del were making. She realized she hadn’t stepped foot there since placing the surveillance device there, and their conversations had not yielded the information she was hoping to learn.

They were attempting to re-establish thruster power on the _Cristofetti_ to enable it to launch.

“Have we heard from the _Enterprise_?” T’Mollek asked Data.

“No, we have not,” he said. “Perhaps there was a delay on Starbase 149.”

“Don’t you think establishing communications with the _Enterprise_ should take priority over thruster power?” she asked.

“President Traegar has deemed thruster capability to be the higher priority,” Data said.

“What do _you_ think?”

He considered the wording of her question. “I _think_ that Commander Riker ordered us to follow President Traegar’s lead. And I _know_ it.”

Who could argue with that? T’Mollek left them to their work.

As she walked toward the door, a sound caught her attention. She turned to see Negan in the corner of the garage, shirtless and shining with sweat, lifting weights. She didn’t realize she was staring until he dropped the barbell, grabbed a towel, and turned to catch her eye. She gave him a curt nod and strode quickly outside, leaving him feeling quite pleased with himself as he wiped his face.


	11. Negan and the Chocolate Factory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan and Dr. O'Reilly get tipsy.

After her work for the day was complete, T’Mollek returned to her tent with a bucket of well water. She poured the water into a pot and turned on the stove to boil it. She removed her increasingly tattered uniform, which she had converted to a short-sleeved jumpsuit after it had suffered multiple tears. After the water had boiled, she took a piece of soap and a rag from her bag and proceeded to give herself a sponge bath as she did every night.

It was a comfortably warm evening and once she was reasonably clean, she changed into the one casual set of clothes she had brought—long, loose-fitting pants and a three-quarter-sleeved shirt. Having her forearms showing made her feel slightly risqué.

She exited her tent and walked east past Negan’s house, giving it a quick glance as she went by. She took a walk up the road to stretch her legs and turned around just before she reached the foot of the steep hill that hid the capital city from view on the other side.

When she reached the compound, she was surprised to see Negan sitting on the porch swing. He wore shorts and that white button-down shirt rolled up to the elbows. He was drinking from a bottle, but it was not a water bottle. Their eyes met and he gave her a wave. She returned the greeting with a nod and continued toward her tent.

As she passed, he called to her, “Come sit.”

“Thank you, but I have work to do,” she said.

“What work?” he taunted. “Tidying your fifteen-square-foot living space? Come _sit_.” He patted the seat next to him with his left hand.

She climbed the steps to the porch. She sighed and sat down next to him. She eyed the bottle in his hand. “Ale? You’ve been holding out.”

He took a swig from the bottle. “A man’s gotta have his little secrets. Ya like a drink?”

“No thank you,” she said primly, sitting up very straight, her back not touching the back of the seat.

“It’ll help you relax,” he urged. “You need to relax.”

“Alcohol has no effect on my physiology.”

Negan grinned wickedly. “I ain’t offerin’ ya alcohol.” He pulled a bottle out of a cooler of ice to his right and held it out to her.

T’Mollek looked at the bottle with interest but tried to look casual. “Is that . . . chocolate milk?”

“Eeeyup,” he said with a lazy drawl. “I made it with that stuff you brought over.”

“That was intended for Elgie,” she said reproachfully.

“She doesn’t need the chocolate as much as you do.”

Not appreciating being told what she “needed” from the likes of him, she sat back. “No, thank you.”

“Just one won’t hurt anything. C’mon. I made it just for you. I thought you’d like it.”

She eyed the bottle with interest as well as caution. “I haven’t had chocolate since I was eleven years old.”

His eyes grew wide with shocked amusement. “Who the fuck gave you chocolate when you were eleven?”

She drew herself up with dignity. “My human grandparents didn’t understand the effect it has on Vulcans. They thought they were giving me a treat.”

In fact, it had been the start of her self-destructive adolescence that eventually led to her exile to Vulcan with T’Sharr.

Negan grinned laconically, acting all disappointed, with those hangdog eyes of his. “Well, I thought I was giving you a treat, too.” He held the bottle out to her and wiggled it back and forth temptingly.

T’Mollek felt that she had protested a sufficient amount. If she could retain control, this might actually prove useful. She took the bottle, took a sip, and winced.

“It might be a little strong,” he admitted with a sly grin.

She cleared her throat and said, “It’s good chocolate. Smooth.”

With that, they relaxed. She sipped her chocolate milk, he sipped his ale. They sat on the swing side by side, looking out on the farm and the hill. He moved the swing with his feet on the porch floor. Her feet dangled over the edge.

“The engineers tell me they haven’t heard from the _Enterprise_ yet. Are the ionic fluctuations still causing a disruption?”

“Yeah, maybe,” he said doubtfully. “Probably.”

She took a long drink.

“How’s that chocolate goin’ down?”

“Mush better,” she said.

“Good.” He grinned again. “There’s more where that came from.”

They slipped into a comfortable silence. T’Mollek held the bottle in her left hand, which hung over the arm rest of the swing. She let her right hand rest on the seat next to her, not realizing Negan’s left hand was already resting precisely on that spot. Her little finger lightly brushed his. His hand stood its ground, but hers hastily moved closer to her own side.

“The crops seem to be doing well,” she remarked.

“Yeah, we only lost a few week’s growth with the tornado,” he said. “The seeds Dr. Hall brought with her are pretty hardy and fast-growing. Genetic modification certainly has its advantages.”

As they made casual small talk, T’Mollek lost track of her hand and it wandered away from her, lightly brushing the side of his. He tilted his hand toward her so his forefinger lifted slightly, and he brushed it against the side of her hand. Instinctively, she tilted her hand likewise and her forefinger brushed against his, not quite interlinked. Did he know that finger stroking was Vulcan foreplay? Embarrassed, she moved her hand away and took another long drink from her bottle.

“Ya know,” Negan said in as relaxed a manner as T’Mollek had ever heard him speak, “my father always said, ‘Never trust a Romulan.’ I never thought I’d be sittin’ on the porch, sharin’ a drink with one.”

“You’re as xenophobic as a Cardashian,” she said. She looked up at him, wondering if he would react to the mention of the race. He had been accused of murdering a Cardassian opponent when he was a professional wrestler in his youth.

“You’re slurring your words,” he pointed out.

“I am Romulan in genetics only. And just barely, at that.”

“You’re more Romulan than you realize.”

“Is that a problem?”

He grinned wickedly, his brilliant white teeth showing, and he gave her a sidelong look. “Nnnnope.”

She was staring at Negan’s hairy legs, which were very close to her fully-panted legs. “It’s warm out here,” she remarked.

“You’re wearin’ too many clothes,” he observed, gently nudging her fully panted knee with his bare one.

“I am wearing the app’opriate number of clothes,” she said with dignity and effort.

“Well, yeah,” he said, “but you’re wearing too much . . . fabric.” He reached down and tugged at her pant leg, his fingers touching her leg beneath the cloth.

She pulled her leg away clumsily and said, “Hanz to yourself.”

“If you say so,” he said, holding up his hands.

“I say so,” she said. Then, just to drive the point home, she added, “I'm wearing jussa mouna righta cloze.” She cleared her throat and tried that again. “Just. The right. Amount. Acloze.”

Negan leaned back in the swing and grinned as she took another long pull. “You might wanna slow down on that stuff.”

“You were the one who wunnid me a relax,” she reminded him.

He took the bottle from her gently. “Yeahhh, but I didn’t realize you were such a lightweight.”

She floatily reached across Negan’s chest for the bottle, and ended up half-sprawling on him. Their faces were nearly touching and she could smell the sweet ale on his breath. She liked the feel of his breath against her breath. His chest was warm and solid against hers. Her right hand rested on his shoulder and her left was still reaching for her bottle. He took her wrists and pulled her upright. “I think it’s time to get you back to your tent after all.”

Her wrists fully in his grasp, her face close to his, she whispered, “Do you intaka tenda vannage of me?”

“No,” he said seriously. “I do _not_ intend to take advantage of you.” Then he moved his mouth to her ear and whispered huskily, “When we fuck for the first time, we’ll both be sober.”

“Ohh,” T’Mollek replied, her voice low in her throat. The blood left her head then, and her eyes rolled back slightly as they closed and her body went limp in his arms.

Negan breathed a chuckle. He wasn’t sure he’d ever made a woman swoon before. He picked her up, and started to carry her to her tent.

She stirred in his arms. “Izzat Elgie crying?”

Negan stopped and pricked up his ears. He hesitated, not hearing anything, but realizing Vulcan ears were sharper than his. He brought T’Mollek back to the house and lay her on the couch, listening for Elgie, who remained silent in her room. He took a blanket out of a chest in the living room and covered the doctor with it.

Then he walked down the hall to his office, carefully stepping on certain floorboards to avoid most of the creaks. He hit one and froze, waiting to see if Elgie woke. After a moment, he went on to his office, closing the door carefully. He turned on the light, hoping it wasn’t shining too brightly outside the door so as to wake Elgie or T’Mollek. He chuckled. T’Mollek hadn’t even finished the entire bottle and she was out cold.

After an hour of sketching out plans for the next few months, making calculations, and running various scenarios, he got up, shut the light out, and went into his room, closing the door behind him.

Three hours later, Negan heard the floor creak. T’Mollek must have awakened and was taking the late-night walk of shame back to her tent. He rolled over with a chuckle. But the squeaking was slow and deliberate and was coming closer. He heard the office door open. Then he heard his bedroom doorknob rattle. He got up and opened the door.

“Did you have a bad dr—?” he looked down at Elgie, but saw T’Mollek’s legs instead. He looked up to see her disheveled red hair and bleary blue eyes. Drolly, he asked, “Can I help you?”

“Where is the front door?” she asked groggily.

“In exactly the opposite direction,” he answered, pointing out the office door.

“Please assept my apology,” she said. “I will be going.”

“Take it slow,” he said. “The floorboards.”

She ambled down the hall but the floorboards squeaked so loudly Elgie woke up. She stumbled out into the hallway.

“What are _you_ doing here?” Elgie asked her.

“Just leaving,” she whispered and went quickly to the door and back to her tent

“Why are the floors so _loud_?” Elgie whined sleepily.

“They’re a good home invasion deterrent,” he answered, leading her back to bed.

***

The next morning, T’Mollek and Jaxon crossed paths outside in the yard. She avoided eye contact but said, “I want to apologize for any—”

He cut her off. “Apology accepted. I was the one who offered you the chocolate milk.”

“You got chocolate milk?” said Elgie, whom neither of them had seen walking up behind them. “Can I have some?”

“No, it’s all gone,” Negan said.  
  
“But why? That’s not fair!” She started to whimper over the egregious oversight.

“It’s not good for you,” he said.

“But everyone else can have chocolate milk! It’s not _fair_!” She started to cry in earnest now.

“Elgie,” Negan said sharply. “Enough.”

Startled, she stopped crying. She turned to T’Mollek, taking her hand. “Will you stop talking and come inside and play with me? P’ease?”

T’Mollek looked up at Negan, who shrugged and nodded, feeling bad for snapping at the little girl.


	12. The Knife

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan doesn't like his little girl playing with knives. T'Mollek tries again to get into his bedroom.

Two mornings later, T’Mollek was enjoying another day off, reading in her tent. Elgie’s voice sounded through the door. “Play with me.”

T’Mollek opened the door to see the little girl, clutching her tiny doll in her hand. “Good morning, Elgie. How are you today?”

“Fine. Come play with me.”

“What contributions have you made to the farm lately, Elgie?”

“I never conchabushened the farm, T’Mollek,” she said defensively.

“I am aware of this. A ‘contribution’ means something that you do to give back. Some work that you can perform to help out on the farm.”

“I can’t work! I’m dest a child!”

“You can absolutely work and be a contributing member of this . . . compound.” She had nearly said “family.”

T’Mollek stood up. “Let’s go. I’m going to teach you how to feed the chickens and gather the eggs.”

“Fix me a snack first.”

“Is there a more respectful way of asking me that?”

“Fix me a snack first. _P’ease_.”

“That is . . . somewhat better.” She followed the little girl out and to her house.

In the kitchen, T’Mollek spotted a bottle of vitamins on the counter.

“Have you taken your vitamin today?”  
  
“I don’t like my vitamins. They’re too yucky for me.”

“After you take your vitamin, we’ll have a snack.” She handed Elgie a vitamin and took a bottle of water out of the refrigerator as well as a bowl of strawberries.

“No, I don’t want fruit!” Elgie protested, taking the water. “I want cookies! Make me cookies!”

“Cookies are not a healthy snack.”

“I don’t like that kind of fruit!”

“Then you will go hungry. Swallow that vitamin.”

Elgie chuffed out an aggravated breath. “Fiiiine.” She swallowed her vitamin and then commanded, “Cut them like hearts!”

T’Mollek set the knife down deliberately and glared at Elgie. In a sweet voice, Elgie asked again, “ _P’ease_ can you cut them like hearts?”

T’Mollek picked the knife back up and began cutting. “You seem to think that playing with you and fixing you snacks is all I am here to do.”

“Well . . .” Elgied chuckled, “dat is pretty much all you’re here to do. Now dat Dr. Hall got dead, who else is dunna do it?”

“Dr. Hall’s job was to . . . nanny you?” she questioned.

“Well, I don’t know ‘bout dat. But she did play with me and feed me and get me ready for bed and get me dressed in the morning and brush my hair and play with me.”

“I thought she was a botanist,” said T’Mollek.

“Dat’s what she was. A botanist is someone who takes care of the animals and feeds children and plays with them and takes care of them.”

“Interesting,” T’Mollek said pensively. This was sounding all too familiar.

“Do’tor T’Mollek . . .” Elgie said.

“Hm?”

Elgie chuckled again. “Dat snack isn’t dunna slice itself!”

“I have a better idea,” she said, placing the knife in the sink. She took a butter knife from the drawer and handed it to the little girl. “Why don’t you slice it?”

“But . . . I’m dest a child.”

“So you’ve said. And this is just a small knife. See? It’s not sharp.” T’Mollek tapped a finger to the edge. “Here. Hold the knife like this. And very gently with this hand, slice like this.” She held Elgie’s hands in hers and guided her.

“I’m cutteen it! I’m cutteen it!” Elgie’s voice was awed and high-pitched.

“You are, indeed.”

Feeling flush with accomplishment, Elgie asked, “Can you teach me how to gavver eggs next?”

T’Mollek smiled in satisfaction. “As soon as you’ve eaten your snack, I will teach you to gather—”

Negan had walked in and before she could finish her sentence, he gently put his hands over Elgie’s and gingerly removed the knife.

“And what have we here?” he asked, smiling through gritted teeth. “Children playin’ with knives? _That_ doesn’t seem particularly safe, now, _does_ it?”

“It’s only dest a soft knife,” Elgie told him. “Not sharp. See? I cutted it myself!” She was beside herself with pride.

“Yes! You certainly _did_!” he said. “And that is the last time I want to see you holding a knife. Understood?”

“Yes, Dzaxon.”

“Now take your snack to your room and behave yourself.”

Elgie left, confused, sad, and afraid she’d done something wrong. She looked back at T’Mollek, who merely nodded to her.

Negan spoke tensely but quietly, closing in on T’Mollek intimidatingly. She took a small step back. “Just what the ten fucks do you think you’re doing?”

“She asked for a snack. I thought it prudent that she learn how to prepare her own. I have other work to do besides babysitting the only able-bodied child here.”

“You know how I feel about weapons.”

“It was a butter knife. Barely sharp enough to slice a strawberry.”

“And you’re going to teach her farm work now? What’s next? Slaughtering livestock? She’s four years old. I’ve allowed you free access to the amenities here, but you have overstepped your bounds. Get out. You’re no longer welcome in this house.”

T’Mollek wiped her hands and regarded Negan. “Elgie is old enough to start taking responsibility for herself. She will never learn to take care of herself if she continues to be coddled.”

“I said go!” he bellowed.

Remembering her place, T’Mollek lowered her head. “Yes, sir. I am sorry.”

She knew she had overstepped her bounds once again. She had missed her chance the previous week to gain access to Negan’s bedroom and search for the evidence she knew was there, that would put him in the highest security prison in the Federation, and now she had been banished not only from the hospital but from his house as well—just when she felt she was getting close.

If she were really being honest with herself, however, she might conclude that she was guilty of purposeful self-sabotage.

Regardless, it appeared she was once again banished from Negan’s house, about which she had mixed feelings. But she still had a job to do. Glancing down at Dr. Nameless on the kitchen counter, she decided she would have to take her plan to the next level.

***

The next morning, T’Mollek’s duty roster included a surprise: the key to the hospital. She had laundry to wash, IVs to prepare, and waking children to comfort.

On her fourth day in a row of hospital duty, T’Mollek went into the field during her lunch break. She headed for the area of the field where Negan was detasseling corn.

“Nice day, isn’t it?” he asked, as she approached.

“Very temperate,” she replied. “I am picking vegetables for my lunch. Do you need any for dinner while I’m at it?”

“Well, that’s real thoughtful of ya, T’Mollek,” he said, pausing in his work to regard her. He wiped his hands on his pants. “Maybe some tomatoes? We still have that spaghetti squash you cooked but we’re out of sauce.”

“Very well,” she said and paused a moment to see if he would ask her to stop over and make the sauce as well. When he said nothing, she asked, “Anything else?”

He shook his head. “Naw, we’re good.” He turned and went back to his work.

As she turned to go, she pulled something out of her pocket and tossed it onto the ground. She walked past it and turned around, looking down at it. “I presume this is Elgie’s and not yours?” She bent over and picked it up.

He looked at the object in her hand—the tiny doll dressed in T’Mollek’s torn uniform.

He smiled. “Yeah, she’s been lookin’ for Dr. Nameless. Thanks.” He put the toy in his pants pocket.

“You’re welcome." She paused, then asked solicitously and a bit over-casually, “How is she doing?”

“She’s doin’ fine,” he said, pinching off the tassel from a stalk of corn. He looked down at her significantly and they held each other’s eyes. He added, more kindly, “She misses you, too.”

Satisfied with that, T’Mollek changed the subject. “Is there a bucket in the barn in which I can transport your tomatoes?”

He smiled. “Yeah, they’re up on a shelf. Let me help you.”

This was more than she had hoped. Negan had been so standoffish since the knife incident that she wasn’t sure she would be able to get back in his good graces. Apparently he was missing her as well.

She entered the barn first and immediately spotted the buckets on a high shelf—too high for her to reach without standing on something. She moved a milking stool to the appropriate spot and climbed on top. Negan was right behind her, saying, “Let me get that for you.”

He reached up to help her, his body touching hers slightly. At his touch, T’Mollek hastily protested that she could do it and in the process, she toppled off the stool and landed on top of him. As she straddled him on the floor of the barn, she looked down at him for a brief moment. There was a bit of a struggle and a tangling of arms and legs in the hay but eventually, flushed and avoiding his eyes, she righted herself, brushed the hay from her hair, and beat a hasty retreat to her tent, sans bucket.

When she returned to her tent, she breathlessly removed Dr. Nameless from her pocket, where she had stashed it after picking Negan’s pocket in the tussle. She hid the toy in her luggage.

***

The next morning, T’Mollek checked her duty roster. Sure enough, she was assigned to the house—breakfast, lessons with Elgie, light housekeeping. She allowed herself a prideful smile, but only a brief one.

At the house, she greeted Elgie and they ate breakfast while Negan went out and worked. This was almost too good to be true, T’Mollek thought. Her powers of persuasion were even stronger than she had realized.

T’Mollek asked Elgie if she was happy to have Dr. Nameless back.

“I never finded her,” she said sadly.

“You didn’t? You mean Jaxon didn’t give her back to you? I found her in the field yesterday.”

“You did?” She looked up at T’Mollek excitedly.

“Yes, I gave her to Jaxon to give to you. He put her in the pocket of his pants.”

“He never gived her to me,” she said in disappointment.

“Well, he must have forgotten,” T’Mollek said. “He was very tired. They must still be in the pocket of the pants he wore yesterday.”

“Oh. He puts his pants in his bedroom.”

“Oh, good!” T’Mollek said encouragingly, getting up and walking to the office. She was dismayed to see that an electronic lock key pad had been installed on the wall.

_No wonder he let me in here alone with Elgie._

Elgie had followed, assuming that T’Mollek could gain access to the office. T’Mollek looked down at Elgie and smiled invitingly, then indicated the keypad with a nod of her head and another encouraging smile.

Elgie gamely pressed every button in turn across the keypad. Each button made a different tone. “That sounds like music!” she said.

“It does,” T’Mollek agreed.

The last button read “ENTER” but when Elgie pressed that one, a loud alarm sounded. Elgie pressed her hands to her ears and shrieked.

“Let’s go outside,” T’Mollek suggested, picking the little girl up and hurrying her out.

Jaxon was already running toward the house furiously.

“I apologize,” T’Mollek said contritely. “Elgie was looking for the toy I gave you yesterday.”

“It fell out of my pocket,” he said, his eyes looking deeply into hers. “I don’t know where it is.”

“Oh, dear.”


	13. Presidential Pressure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Elgie is injured. Negan and T'Mollek engage in sensual massage.

The next day, T’Mollek was back on hospital duty. The children continued to improve somewhat, but there was still no rhyme or reason for it that T’Mollek could guess. The lab, however, had been locked and she couldn’t get in without breaking down the door even if she wanted to.

And, she realized, she wanted to.

She eyed the door longingly as she walked past on her way out of the building at the end of the day. She opened the front door of the hospital to find Negan running across the road toward her, carrying Elgie in his arms.

When they neared, she saw that Elgie was pale and clutching a towel that was red with blood.

“She cut her finger,” Negan growled as he climbed the stairs to the hospital. He added accusingly, “With a knife.”

He took her to the examination room on the opposite side of the building from the quarantine room. Because most of the medical supplies, including the hypospray canister and laser surgical device, had been destroyed in the crash, there were few options to make Elgie more comfortable. T’Mollek drew upon her Emergency Triage and Medical Administration class from her Academy days nearly twenty years before. She was able to clean the wound, assess the damage, and stitch her up using the available supplies.

“What were you doing with a knife, Elgie?” T’Mollek asked to distract the little girl from the pain of the stitches.

“I was dest trying to cut Dzaxon some strawberry hearts,” she said in a tiny voice.

“You were helping, weren’t you? You wanted to give him a nice snack.”

“Yes”

“That was very thoughtful. Did you forget to select a ‘soft’ knife?”

“Uh-huh,” she said. “I thought it was just a regliar knife.” Her voice lowered to a whisper. “ _It_ _wasn’t._ ”

“That is a mistake most people make only once,” T’Mollek assured her.

After her finger was stitched and bandaged, Negan picked up the child to carry her back to the house. As he took a step for the door, Elgie reached her good hand out to T’Mollek. T’Mollek reached back, and Elgie clutched the doctor’s fingers silently. T’Mollek looked at Negan, who merely nodded. T’Mollek followed them back to the house, her fingers still in Elgie’s hand and her body touching Negan’s as they walked.

When they returned to the house, Negan lay Elgie in her bed and gently tucked her in. Elgie wanted T’Mollek to stay with her and Negan, grateful for the excellent care she had given her, allowed it. He gave Elgie a kiss goodnight and left the room with a glance back at the doctor. T’Mollek sat by Elgie’s bedside.

“I don’t want to die,” Elgie whispered, her eyes wide.

“You are not going to die.”

“Yes, I am!” she argued. “Everybody dies.”

“That is true,” T’Mollek acknowledged, “but you are in no danger of dying from this wound.”

“What am I in danger of dying of?”

T’Mollek sighed with a little smile. “There is no danger of you dying at all in the immediate future.”

“When will I die?”

“I do not know that.”

“Am I dunna get sick like the other children?”

“That does not appear to be the case.”

“But how will I know when I get sick?”

“You would feel . . . uncomfortable in your abdomen,” she said, placing her hand on her belly. “Have you ever vomited?”

“I don’t sink so.”

“Well, you would probably vomit. Your stomach would hurt and then food that you have recently digested, along with bile and other fluids, would eject uncontrollably through your mouth.”

“That sounds terrible.”

“It is unpleasant, to be sure.”

“Have you ever bomited?”

“Several times. But not because of Tarsen’s disease.”

“Why not?”

“I can’t get Tarsen’s disease because I am part Vulcan. Nobody who is part Vulcan can get Tarsen’s.”

“Maybe I’m part Vulcan,” Elgie said hopefully.

“You are Algalonian. But somehow you have been lucky not to get Tarsen’s disease.”

“When did you bomit?”

“When I was a child—a few years older than you—my grandparents gave me chocolate milk. Chocolate makes all Vulcans sick if they drink too much. But they didn’t know that.”

“But Dzaxon gived you chocolate milk, you said.”

“A little in moderation is OK,” she acknowledged. “Only for adult Vulcans.”

“Would it make me bomit?”

“No, it would not,” she said. “Most recently, the first day I arrived on Algalon. I hit my head and it made me vomit.”

“Is that all?” Elgie asked.   
  
“No, I also had a headache.”

“No, I mean, is that all that will happen when I get sick like the other children?”

“No, you would get a dark blue, purple, or black rash on your wrists,” T’Mollek said. “But again, I don’t think you’re going to get sick like the other children.”

Elgie quickly held up her wrists, turning her hands over and over. She sighed deeply and dramatically. “Whew! No rash yet!”

T’Mollek carefully took this child’s hands in hers and lay them gently down on her blankets. “Indeed not,” she whispered, giving her a light kiss on the forehead.

All during this conversation, T’Mollek had been stroking Elgie’s nose from the bridge to her forehead, repeatedly. Now she lightly fluttered her fingertips downward against the child’s eyelids, forcing them to close. When Elgie opened them, T’Mollek brushed her lids again repeatedly, until they remained closed. She stroked her eyebrows and her cheekbones below her eye socket. She ran her fingers down her temple and her jawline.

After a moment, Elgie yawned deeply and murmured, “Ni-night, T’Mama . . .” and was asleep within seconds.

“Goodnight, my one,” T’Mollek whispered.

She sat and watched the little girl for a few moments, waiting for her sleep to deepen so that she could leave without waking her. She started to stand when she heard a squeaky floorboard—that one board that could never be avoided. She looked up, startled to see Negan standing in the doorway, watching her.

“Is that a Vulcan trick?” he whispered, walking carefully toward them.

T’Mollek shook her head. “It’s a Grandma O’Reilly trick,” she said. “It was the only way she could get me to sleep after—” She stopped short, then finished, “after I’d lain in bed for too long without sleeping.”

Her heart beat faster. The less she said about her parents’ murders, the less likely Negan would realize who she was.

“What were you doing exactly?” he asked eagerly. “How does it work?”

He knelt down on the floor in front of her chair, close to her, and the floor creaked loudly. Elgie stirred. He carefully moved closer to T’Mollek, his arm touching the inside of her right knee. She took a sharp breath involuntarily. Every instinct told her to move her knee, to break the physical contact with him, but she forced herself not only to remain, but to even press her knee into his arm slightly.

T’Mollek tried to sound casual. “It’s actually acupressure, although Grandma O’Reilly didn’t know that at the time. Perfected by the Chinese of ancient Earth. This spot here, between the eyes, just at the top of the bridge of the nose is known as the Third Eye.” She pointed to Elgie’s forehead without touching it.

“And the other thing you were doing, the eyebrow thing? What’s that called?”

T’Mollek stroked Elgie’s eyebrows. “This isn’t acupressure. It’s just relaxing.”

She ran her fingers through Elgie’s hair gently pulling the locks away from her scalp.

“It sure seems to be,” Negan said, hinting, but not looking at T’Mollek. “I need someone to do this to help _me_ sleep at night.”

She turned up an eyebrow slyly. “I will ask Mr. Data if he has information about acupressure techniques in his positronic network,” she said lightly. “I hear that, for an android, he has a very gentle touch.

Negan shot her a wide grin, but his eyes had a vague sadness to them. “Touché,” he said, with a reluctant smile. He looked back at Elgie and said softly, “I thought you were doing a mind meld on her.”

Hesitantly, T’Mollek said, “Not all Vulcans can perform the mind meld.” She seemed embarrassed.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

“It’s not a fact widely known among outworlders,” she said. “It makes us appear . . . weak.”

“So you’ve never done a mind meld?”

“I did attempt one somewhat recently,” she answered, forced to tell the truth. “It nearly drove both of us mad. I would never put Elgie at such risk.”

She stopped stroking Elgie’s hair as her snores deepened. “She is in delta sleep. We should leave her be.”

Negan moved away from T’Mollek’s leg and stood up. She also stood and walked carefully to the door, trying not to make too much noise. Elgie stirred and rolled over, mumbling something about chocolate milk. T’Mollek held the door open, waiting for Negan, who bent to kiss Elgie on the forehead. He walked out the door as T’Mollek watched him, and she closed the door on her way out.

T’Mollek followed Negan to the living room and began gathering her medical supplies. “If she wakes in the night and experiences pain, you can give her three milliliters of the analgesic on her nightstand.”

“Please stay,” Negan said. “If she wakes up, she’ll be expecting you to be there with her.”

“I should go to my tent.”

He gave her a charming smirk. “Why?”

 _Because I’m afraid of what I will do to you if I stay_. “Because it is where I belong,” she said aloud.

“I think tonight, you belong here,” he said.

T’Mollek hesitated.

He said in a deep, authoritative voice, “I’m still president here.”

She raised an eyebrow, and he grinned. That got her attention.

“But I’m askin’ nicely,” he added with a charming smile.

T’Mollek sighed. “I suppose I could stay tonight, in case the pain wakes her up.”

Negan nodded, pleased with the arrangement. He sat down on one side of the couch and looked at her expectantly. She hesitated again and then sat awkwardly on the far opposite side, leaving space for at least two people between them.

“What was that thing called again that you were doin’ to her?” he asked, putting his fingers to his forehead.

“The Third Eye.”

He scooted closer to her. “Can you teach me? Elgie has insomnia a lot. I’m up with her for hours some nights.”

For weeks, T’Mollek had imagined what his face would feel like—his jawline, his cheekbones, his beard with the dimples peeking out. Was his hair soft or coarse? His eyes were tired and his skin was tanned. His eyebrows were thick and dark. She wondered what his hair smelled like. She felt two chills go down each side of her ribcage. She realized with annoyance that she was actually aching to touch him. But she could not touch his face because she might inadvertently link minds with him, something she had just told him she could not do. And not only that, she might actually lose herself in the experience. And she had to remain in control.

“You saw what I did,” she said elusively.

“It was dark.” His voice was low, gravelly, and cajoling.

“It’s quite simple,” she said, edging toward the inevitable. “Gently massage the sinus pressure points.”

Negan massaged his own forehead a few seconds, then said, “I don’t think it works when you do it to yourself.”

“Perhaps not.”

He sat back and scoffed, amused and resigned rather than annoyed. He tried another tack. He leaned against the back on the couch with his elbow on the back cushion and rested his head on his fist. “So. You lived on a farm?”

This change in subject had the desired effect, although she didn’t show it. It startled her.

“For a time,” she said guardedly.

“With your parents, or . . .?”

She suddenly stood and picked up the bloodied towels, putting them in the nearby laundry basket. “Actually, I will wash these tonight before returning to my tent.”

Still seated, Negan reached out and lightly took her wrist. She looked down at it pointedly, but he didn’t remove it. In fact, he lightly brushed his thumb against the bottom of her wrist, causing an involuntary but indiscernible shiver deep in her belly.

“No,” he said. “Please stay. She sleeps light when she’s hurt or upset. If she wakes up in the middle of the night, she’ll cry for you.”

T’Mollek looked into his pleading eyes. She wanted him so desperately. “I really should go.”

“You really should stay,” he said almost in a whisper.

T’Mollek let her heart and stomach settle for a moment. “Very well.” She remains outwardly in control, but she can feel her pulse throbbing in her neck.

“I’ll get you your blanket.” The blanket he had covered her with a week ago was now “her” blanket. He got it out of the chest and handed it to her. All the while, he looked at her in that intense way he had, his eyes never leaving hers, like he knew all her secrets and it delighted—and saddened—him.

“Thank you,” she said primly, taking the blanket from him. They stood and stared at each other. She became uncomfortable and didn’t know what to do. She looked awkwardly down at the blanket in her hands and around the room.

“I’m sorry,” Negan said, catching on, “were you ready to turn in already?”

“I usually read before sleeping.”

“Ah. I don’t have much in the way of literature here, except picture books and _Alice in Wonderland_. Which I take it you’ve read?”

“My great-great-grandmother read it to me when I was Elgie’s age.”

“OK,” he said, “so how about we just talk a while?”

Her heartrate picked up slightly. She would have to be extremely cautious. “All right.”

She sat down stiffly on the couch, her back straight, the blanket lying protectively on her lap. He smiled and took the blanket from her, setting it on the floor behind him. She sat with her hands on her knees. She was even more on edge than she had been during her interview with Captain Picard, Commander Riker, and Counselor Troi when she’d first joined the _Enterprise_ crew.

As for Negan, he resumed his casual lounging stance in the corner of the couch, leaning against the back cushions. He tucked his right leg tucked under him, facing her, his head on his fist. He chuckled. “C’mon. We’re friends here. Don’t be so stiff and formal. Sorry I’m out of chocolate milk.”

They both smiled a little. He leaned forward and lightly touched her elbow. She awkwardly relaxed, and settled back into the couch, still stiffly, but leaning back against the cushions now.

“What would you like to talk about?” she asked.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he said. “You’ve been here a long time and I don’t really know anything about you.”

“And I know nothing about you. What did you do before you arrived on Algalon twenty-five years ago?”

“I was in politics,” he said cagily. “Before that, I was a teacher.”

She knew that to be a lie. Negan had never attended any institution of higher learning. He had become a professional wrestler at the age of eighteen. He must have been describing the history of the real Jaxon Traegar—who was either a real person whose identity he had stolen or a fictitious one he had created himself.

“What does this represent?” she asked, reaching forward and lightly fingering the skull-on-arrows charm dangling from the bracelet on his wrist. Her thumb accidentally brushed the hair of his wrist.

He lifted his head from his hand and looked at it. “This is a reminder that life is short but it’s never too late to start over.”

“How does a skull and three arrows represent that?” she asked with an innocent frown.

“Just does,” he said with some finality. “So, T’Mollek O’Reilly. Your turn. Tell me about you.”

“There is not much to tell. I studied infectious diseases before settling on pediatrics as a career. I was stationed at Starbase Eleven when I was assigned to the _Enterprise_ to join this mission to cure the children.” She lowered her voice and added bitterly, “I obviously failed.”

“What are you gonna do when the _Enterprise_ comes back?”

“I will most likely be returned to the starbase where I will resume my responsibility as pediatrician.”

“Do you like it on the starbase?”

“‘Like it’?”

“Do you find it _satisfying_?”

“I do.”

“I don’t know,” he said, “it seems like life on a starbase would be a little . . . limiting. Not much to do, not much to aspire to. What do you do when you’re not caring for children?”

“Read. Study. Research.”

“Art?”

“Excuse me?”

“I know Vulcans appreciate art,” he said. “I was just wondering if you had any artistic hobbies or . . .?” T’Mollek stared at him quizzically. He shook his head, trying a new line. “What are your ambitions?”

T’Mollek took a deep breath and exhaled through her nose in mild annoyance. “I fail to understand why so many people are concerned about my ambitions.”

“You don’t make it easy, do you?” he grinned sadly. “To get to know you?”

“I often hear that complaint.”

“I’m sure,” he said, pinching the bridge of his nose and squinting his eyes closed. “Well, I guess I’ll leave you alone then. I’ll try not to keep you awake. I meant it when I said I haven’t been sleeping lately. Having a hard time shutting down my thoughts.”

“You do look rather haggard,” she agreed.

Negan laughed out loud. “I guess I had that comin’.” He made rather a show of rubbing his eyes with the bottoms of his hands. He groaned a little yawn as he spoke. “All right, g’night then.” He started to stand.

T’Mollek intentionally took the bait, playing the role he expected—that she was there to play. “Wait. Let me help you to relax.”

He was amazed his ploy had worked. “Seriously?”

She looked him in the eye. “I am always serious.”

“Well, all right then,” he said with tired enthusiasm. “What do I need to do?”

“Just sit back. Close your eyes.” He complied. “Let me remind you that we will not be joining minds.” She hoped.

“‘Course not,” he said quietly, opening his eyes to look at her. “‘Cause you can’t do that.”

His warm brown eyes were almost lovingly sympathetic. Was he implying that he didn’t believe her? Or was he connecting with her sense of otherness and being not-quite-enough? How was it possible that she was feeling this connection?

Well, he was the human who convinced ten thousand Vulcans that he had the cure to their disease—the disease that he, in fact, was partially responsible for giving them in the first place. If she were falling for his charm, she supposed she was in good company. But she knew what they didn’t know—that he was a charlatan and a murderer with no consideration for anyone but himself.

And yet—his face betrayed years of pain and torment. He had taken charge of an entire planet, successfully run it peacefully and happily for twenty-five years, until virtually all of his citizens had been tortured, murdered, imprisoned by Romulans. He had risked his own life to save a handful of children and had managed to keep them alive, even despite the onset of this epidemic. He had given those children everything he could. It could not have been easy, and he had sacrificed a great deal.

She reached up to touch the creases near his eyes. She smoothed them down as though doing so would erase the memories as well as the lines.

“This is merely acupressure to induce relaxation and serenity,” she crooned.

Negan leaned back and closed his eyes. With a playful smile at the corner of his mouth, he murmured huskily, “I’m all yours.”

T’Mollek placed her right hand on the left side of his face. Her fingers touched his hairline at the temple, her thumb pressing gently against the indentation at the bridge of his nose. “As I said before, this pressure point is known as the Third Eye.”

After a few minutes of gently applying and releasing pressure, she ran her fingers sensually across his eyebrows and beneath his eyes. They both said, by means of description, “Grandma O’Reilly’s trick.”

They both chuckled lightly at their simultaneous use of the phrase. Then he opened his eyes and looked down at her more seriously.

“Do the other thing.”

“What other thing?”

He grinned. “The _other_ thing. With the hair.”

“I don’t think . . .”

“You never say my name,” he said suddenly.

“I’m sorry?”

“Why don’t you ever call me by my name?” his eyes were searching hers.

“President Traegar . . .”

“C’mon. After everything that happened today? Call me Jaxon.”

“Sir . . .”

His voice became a little more commanding. “Call me Jaxon.”

“J-Jaxon,” she said. The false name came unnaturally to her lips. “It’s getting late . . .”

Negan leaned in so close she could feel his breath on her face. “I can hear your heart _poundin’_.”

She took a slightly sharper than usual intake of breath, cleared her throat, and swallowed hard. She put her fingers to his head, hesitated a moment, and then combed them through his hair. After a few moments, she began to massage his scalp with her fingers, releasing a great deal of the tension that had built in him.

She had to be very careful to block her thoughts from entering his. She could feel him trying to sense them—or maybe it was just her paranoia. Either way, she had to think of something distracting—something completely different from her past or her plans for him on Algalon.

She decided that now might be her only chance to get close to him, so she took a deep breath and concentrated on something more . . . distracting. Whether in response to her thoughts or to what she was doing to him physically, he uttered a very low, guttural moan. She suddenly remembered to breathe, and did so loudly—a sharp gasp. He opened his eyes and grinned at her.

“Right?” he agreed. He sat forward and leaned toward her. “I wanna make you feel that good.”

Her heart skidded sideways in her chest. She regained control of her breathing and answered, “No, thank you.”

His grin widened.

“Close your eyes,” she whispered, and still smiling, he obeyed. “You wished to learn the other acupressure techniques to counter sleeplessness?”

“I did indeed.”

Drawing her feet up, she got herself into a kneeling position on the couch next to him, her knees touching his thigh. She moved her hand to the back of his neck, half an inch to each side of his spine.

“Now then,” she said. “These are the ‘Heavenly Pillars’.”

He growled a low “mmm” of approval and agreement. Her touch was indeed heavenly.

After this, she began massaging the hollow under the base of his skull. “And this is the Wind Mansion.”

Negan chuckled and opened his eyes, suddenly fully grounded. “‘ _Wind_ Mansion’?”

“I didn’t name these pressure points,” she protested mildly. “The ancient Chinese did. Shall I stop?”

She pulled her hands away. He took them in his, holding her hands very close to his face. They were eye to eye.

“No, no,” he said. “It feels good. Keep going. I just . . . don’t need to hear all the names for it.”

He gently placed her hands back on his neck, leaving her face close to his. They could feel each other’s breathing, shallow and tentative. He held her hands to the back of his neck just a second too long. They continued to hold eye contact as she applied pressure on the back of his warm neck. He removed his hands from hers, letting her do her work.

“Close your eyes,” she continued in a low, weak voice, looking at every part of his face but his eyes. His beard, the dimple in his right cheek. The lines around his eyes. His nose.

“All right,” she said and cleared her throat. “Those are the pressure points I administered on Elgie.”

“You mean there’s more?”

“Er, yes, a few.”

“Well . . . ?” he said, expectantly.

“They would not be appropriate for a child.”

“What about for me?” he asked.

T’Mollek’s head swam. She was still looking down, her voice weak, breathy, almost elevated. “You want me to demonstrate the . . . remaining relaxation-inducing pressure points?”

“Yeah,” he growled hungrily, “I want ‘em all.”

“Very well.”

She moved cautiously to the center of his chest—the Sea of Tranquility, although she kept the name to herself, per his request. His shirt was buttoned to just below his throat, so she methodically unbuttoned it to give herself access to his skin. She put her fingers on his taut chest, covered with dark but graying hair. He took a deep breath at her touch.

“Excuse me,” she said. She glanced at his face to determine his level of relaxation and was startled to realize his eyes were open and he was gazing at her, his brow furrowed slightly, his lips parted, their faces still very close. “Is this . . . not relaxing you?”

Negan’s voice was wry. “I’m feeling both relaxed _and_ tense.”

She sat back. “I apologize. Acupressure is based on Earth and was not my primary course of study.” She pulled her hands away again, already missing the feeling of him.

His eyes locked intensely on hers, he took her hands again and said, very low and very slow, “I didn’t. Say. Stop.”

T’Mollek made a decision. Now was the time. No more playing games. She would take advantage of the sustained eye contact, oxytocin release be damned. She still had logic on her side. She need not succumb to a chemically induced sense of trust and closeness. Of desire. Of addiction. She would remain in control.

“The final pressure point for sleep is in the feet,” she said.

In one swift, deft move, Jaxon kicked off both shoes and settled back onto the cushions, lying on his back. His eyes never left hers. Keeping their eyes locked, she pressed the divots beneath his ankles. Then, she slowly moved her hands to the sole of one foot a third of the way down from the top pad. He gasped.

“Did you feel a release of energy?” she asked innocently.

“I almost felt a release of _something_ . . .”

T’Mollek relentlessly moved to the other foot. His eyes rolled back in his head.

“Nnngggh!” he grunted, throwing his head back in near-ecstacy. “What’s that one called?”

“ _Yong quan_.”

Breathing hard and tensely trying to keep his voice steady, he asked, “Which means?”

Hesitant and embarrassed, T’Mollek answered, “The Gushing Waters.”

Negan gasped and laughed, his head still back, his eyes still closed. “You say this is to help me _sleep_?”

“Actually . . . no,” she admitted, her thumbs still pressed into the center of the sole of his foot. “Not this one.”

He stopped laughing at looked at her with a new realization, appearing astonished.

She continued her uncompromising assault on this unexpectedly sexual area of his body. She didn’t need to tell him that this was in fact the pressure point to induce arousal. Her heavy-lidded eyes said it all. She was about to fulfill the first part of her true mission here, as ordered by T’Sharr: to seduce the man who had murdered her parents.

Jaxon gently but firmly kicked T’Mollek’s hand away, sat up, and grabbed her arms roughly, lifting her easily on top of him. She wondered if he might actually be nearly as strong as she. Gripping her shoulders tightly, he quickly scanned every part of her face, determining just what to do with her. With a low growl, he took the obvious route and put his mouth on hers. She knew she should feel only revulsion, but her body had its own ideas. Her thighs melded into his as naturally as if they were one body. As she straddled him, he unzipped her shirt.

“No,” she said. “Not here.”

“ _Here_ ,” he said, gruffly disagreeing.

He pulled her shirt down from her shoulders and buried his face in her neck, his beard doing unbelievable things to her nerve endings. She inhaled the scent of his hair. Her eyes rolled back in her head. She understood this now—the effect of pheromones. She could deal with this, remain in control. Maybe.

Her heart pounded in her chest, in her ears. She pressed herself on top of him, grinding herself onto him and kissing him back. It felt right. Her worst fear about this mission was coming true. If she was not careful, she would fully succumb to the addiction of emotion.

He reached a hand toward her neck and she instinctively shied away. But he was reaching for the pendant that hung from her neck. He had never noticed it before as she wore it tucked into her uniform shirt. He held it between his fingers for a moment before dropping it and sliding his hand up her jawline and into her hair. He gently pulled her head back by the hair, exposing her neck to him. He kissed it again and put his hands on either side of her waist, his thumbs pressing into her belly, which shuddered at his touch.

“No,” she said again. “What if Elgie wakes up and comes out here?”

“She won’t,” he said, his voice muffled in her hair. “She sleeps like the dead.” He pushed her hair back from her face and bit her ear lightly. She moaned uncontrollably and sank onto him, her body seeming to melt onto his.

“You asked me to stay on the basis that she sleeps lightly and might wake up,” she muttered shakily, her eyes on his, trying to stay afloat. “I don’t want to do this out here.”

“What is this, some sort of a modesty thing?” Negan asked with a grin, his dimples flashing beneath his graying whiskers. “Look, T’Mollek. Even when this city was fully populated, I’ve always been . . .” He struggled for the right word. “Territorial. I don’t take women into my bed.”

As though drenched in cold water, she came back to her senses. “You just mark them out in the open, where you can leave them afterward,” she said, slowly regaining her sense of dignity and decorum. “Alone.”

“No, no, it’s not like that,” he protested weakly, knowing he’d just blown the moment. T’Mollek was already zipping her uniform shirt and crawling off of his lap. She handed him his shoes.

“Since Elgie sleeps, as you say, ‘like the dead,’ there is no reason for me to stay. Goodnight.”

She stumbled out of the house rather dizzily, the floor squeaking loudly. She heard Elgie call out sleepily, “Dr. T’Mollek?” as she closed the door. She didn’t turn back.

She knew T’Sharr would be disappointed in her show of strength, but she just couldn’t bring herself to submit to his will. She wasn’t strong enough to act weak. Not yet.

She went back to her tent and works off her frustration by shadow boxing her imaginary luchador.


	14. Domestic Life Was Never Quite My Style

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan tries to domesticate Dr. O'Reilly.

T’Mollek’s sore muscles the next morning reminded her that she had been neglecting her calisthenics. Although she was getting plenty of exercise on the farm, the workout that mattered was training for what was to come—and she was growing rusty.

She performed her morning ablutions, got dressed, and checked the duty roster that Negan hung on her tent door every morning. Then she headed for the barn. Negan passed by on his way to the hospital to check on the children.

“Dinner tonight?” he asked casually. “At the house?”

“It’s not on my roster,” she said. “What would you like me to cook?”

“No, no, no, it’s not like that,” he said. “I’m cooking. You were right, I behaved badly last night. Let me make it up to you with dinner.”

“Very well. What time shall I arrive?”

“Six.”

“I will bring vegetables for a salad.”

“Sounds great.” He headed for the hospital and she went into the barn.

She felt a blush grow on her cheeks. Negan had just asked her out on a date.

***

At six, promptly, T’Mollek knocked on Negan’s door. She held a basket filled with greens, carrots, radishes, and a yellow bell pepper. Negan opened the door. T’Mollek gasped inwardly. She didn’t flinch, but her eyes were drawn downward.

Negan was glistening wet with a towel wrapped around his waist, and he was rubbing his hair dry with another. His body was otherworldly. Broad shoulders, dark chest hair, tanned skin, the taut muscles she had felt—a number of times—beneath his shirt, tattoos, and thick scars on his shoulders. The “V” shaped ridge where his lower abdominal muscles met his hip flexors peeked out above the low-riding towel around his waist. That was the area she couldn’t take her eyes from. He was not a particularly young man, but he took excellent care of his body.

Brimming with self-confidence and shameless delight over the power he obviously had over her, Negan welcomed her with cheerful nonchalance. “Hi. C’mon in.”

T’Mollek moved her eyes upward to his eyes. “I thought you said six.”

He grinned and gave her a tiny shrug. “I did.”

She eyed his chest again and quietly acknowledged her acceptance of his unspoken seduction. “So this is how it’s going to be.”

“Apparently so,” he said, flashing a brilliant white smile, his upper teeth sparkling.

She walked past him into the house, her clothed arm brushing against his bare one. “You are bad . . .” she muttered.

“Naw,” he said, closing the door. “I’m just showin’ off.”

She turned to face him and raised an eyebrow. “That you have personal access to a shower and I do not?”

He chuckled softly. “Is that all you’re takin’ away from this?”

T’Mollek involuntarily looked down at his chest again, opened her mouth to speak, then shook her head and turned, headed toward the kitchen with her basket of vegetables. She misremembered the spatial relationship between her position on the floor and the door frame. That would leave a bruise. To her embarrassment, she heard Negan chuckle again.

While she and Elgie cleaned and prepared the vegetables for the salad, Negan cooked dinner. And then he burned dinner.

“How have the two of you survived all this time?” she muttered.

“It has not been easy,” Elgie said with a sad shake of her head.

“Would you like help with dinner?” she asked dryly. She wasn’t sure why she hadn’t seen this coming.

Elgie’s ears perked up. “Will you make fried chicken?”

“I will make roasted chickpeas.”

“Did you say ‘roasted _chicken_?’” Elgie asked optimistically.

“I said roasted chick _peas._ You liked them.”

“Not as much as I like _fried_ chick- _en.”_

“I understand.”

Elgie adorably held up her bandaged index finger. “P’ease? I cutted my finger off . . .”

“You are utilizing hyperbole in an attempt to manipulate me,” T’Mollek chided.

“I do have some thawed,” Negan said thoughtfully. “It’s the last of the meat from the freezer . . . And fried chicken is good for the soul.”

“I do not believe in the soul,” T’Mollek said firmly.

They looked at her pleadingly. She sighed. “Very well. I will cook you one last fried chicken dinner.”

“Yesss!” Elgie cheered.

“Elgie, you set the table,” she told her.

Suddenly deflated, Elgie whispered, “Oh, maaan!”

After Elgie set the table, she requested that Negan join her in the living room to play. He glanced at T’Mollek, who nodded her approval. T’Mollek opened the cupboard, but the object she needed was too high for her to reach. She pulled a chair over and stepped onto it.

Negan heard the noise and walked in. “I keep forgetting how short you are,” he said. “What do you need?”

“The cast iron skillet.”

Negan reached it easily and handed it to her. He held her hand as she climbed back down. She opened the smaller refrigerator and removed three bottles of water.

“Don’t use those,” he said. “I’m saving them for the herb garden. The well water’s extra murky today. I need to clean out the filter. Use the water from the big one.” He tilted his head toward the larger refrigerator.

T’Mollek made a mental note to test the well water again for contaminants. Although she was still forbidden from entering the lab, she had retained one of the microscopes in her tent.

She noticed the cast iron skillet was in need of seasoning. She poured a small amount of oil in the pan and rubbed it all over. Then she placed it in the oven to heat.

“You forgetted to put the food inside, T’Mollek!” Elgie scoffed in amusement.

“I am seasoning the skillet.”

“Huh?”

“The heat breaks down the oil and causes it to bond with the metal.”

Negan looked thoughtful. Elgie looked confused.

“It allows for better cooking,” she clarified.

That was all they needed to hear. They left her to cook and serve the food. Elgie ate hungrily. Negan only picked at his.

“Is something the matter with your meal?” T’Mollek asked.

“No. No, it’s fine,” he said. “It’s just that . . . I don’t know, it doesn’t seem to have the . . . magic it did the last time.”

“The ‘magic’?” she repeated, thinking of a certain former friend whom she had chased out of her life for using “magic.”

“Yeah,” he said coolly. “I think the magic’s gone.”

She felt a similar sinking feeling in her chest and stomach. “I see.”

Elgie, who had eyes only for her chicken leg, said through a mouthful, “It taste-ez pretty magical to me!”

“Thank you, Elgie.”

“I wish you could cook dinner for us every night!” she sighed wistfully.

Negan set his fork down, leaning back a little in his chair. “What do you say? It must be lonely eating every meal by yourself in your tent. How about sharing a few dinners a week with us? We won’t make you cook _every_ night.” He said the last sentence in a tone that implied they wouldn’t _want_ to eat her cooking every night.

She was somewhat set off-kilter by the mixed signals Negan was sending. The near-miss sexual experience. The wet, semi-naked flirtation in his bath towel. Then the sudden assertion that the “magic was gone.” And now a standing date several times a week.

“I am sure I could make arrangements a _few_ evenings per week,” she said somewhat dubiously.

Negan nodded, his dimples in full force. “Good.”

After dinner, T’Mollek started to clean up the kitchen. Negan handed her a clipboard and a pen.

“Here,” he said. “You haven’t been writing down your hours. I’ve let it go, but you really gotta keep better records.”

T’Mollek was fully taken aback. “Excuse me?”

“Domestic work is still work, Doctor,” he said authoritatively. “We gotta track our efficiencies and inefficiencies so we can improve.”

“Improve what? The _Enterprise_ is due back in ten days. Why are you concerned with efficiency now?”

“Efficiency is always important, isn’t it?”

She heard T’Sharr’s voice in her head, admonishing her to be compliant at all times, to not show strength. “Yes, of course.” She took the clipboard from him and wrote, “6:00—Start dinner.”

Calmly, but vaguely menacing, Negan said, “Just learn to follow the rules.” Suddenly all dimples and charm, he said, “Elgie! Would you like to play a game of checkers in the living room?”

“Yes!” Elgie squealed in delight, running toward him. She jumped into his arms and they went off.

Negan didn’t look back.

So this wasn’t a date; it was a new job—housekeeper, cook, nanny. He didn’t see her as an equal. T’Sharr had been right: he was trying to break her down. She had understood that this was coming, and she would follow through on her orders through submissiveness.

As she had known she would, she felt completely humiliated—doubly so, for she had allowed a glimpse of emotion—pleasure—to show, and it allowed him to reject her. He had seen that she was pleased to be a part of his life, and he threw it back in her face for the sole reason of keeping her under his thumb.

Her plan was working. But she didn’t like the feeling—not at all.

***

The next evening, T’Mollek returned to her tent after her duties were complete. She was grateful for an evening to herself. As she reached the door, Negan called out to her from his porch.

“Dinner tonight?”

She sighed. There was no use arguing. “Very well.”

He grinned charmingly. “You don’t have to bring anything. Tonight’s all on me.”

“All right,” she said, her eyes softening. “Six o’clock?”

“Sure,” he said. “Promise I’ll be fully dressed.”

T’Mollek raised an eyebrow. “If you insist.”

Promptly at six that evening, T’Mollek arrived on the doorstep, a small package in her hands. She knocked and the door opened. She kept her eyes up so as to avoid the tempting sight of sexy man-chest—just in case. No one was there. She looked down and saw Elgie at the door. The child looked rather annoyed, but let her in without a word.

“Good evening, Elgie,” T’Mollek said. “How pleasant to see you.”

Without a word, Elgie stalked off into her room. T’Mollek stood there a moment, waiting to see if Negan would greet her. She let herself in and as she walked across the small living room to the kitchen, she peered to the left down the hall. His office door was closed and she saw through the edge of the doorway that the light was on in the room.

In the kitchen, she found various vegetables lined up on the counter with a clipboard and a note: “Be sure to log your hours.”

T’Mollek sighed and began washing and preparing the vegetables. All alone. Why had she thought, after the previous evening’s ice show, that Negan had been offering to cook for her tonight? Ridiculous.

After ninety minutes, she knocked on Negan’s door. He opened it.

“Dinner is ready.”

“Thanks,” he said tersely and followed her out, deliberately closing the door behind him.

In the kitchen, he saw the bundle she had left on the counter. “What’s that?”

“Dessert.”

Sounding almost irritated, he said, “I told you not to bring anything.”

“You told me I did not _need_ to bring anything,” she corrected him. “I assumed that meant you would be cooking.”

“Never assume,” he mumbled gruffly and walked into the living room. He sat down next to Elgie on the couch, looking over her shoulder at the book she was reading. He whispered something at her and she smiled up at him.

T’Mollek watched this for a few moments and then said, “Elgie? Wash your hands. Dinner is ready.”

“No thanks,” she said, not looking up from her book. “I’m not hungry.”

“I brought you a treat for dessert,” T’Mollek said.

Elgie’s eyes lit up. She looked to Negan for approval. He almost imperceptibly shook his head.

“No, thanks,” she said quietly, and looked back down at her book.

Extremely irritated, T’Mollek pulled herself together and stoically stalked back to the kitchen. She didn’t even want to be here, and yet here she was, sitting at their table, serving herself a plate of food, and eating it. All alone. As if she were a servant. Then she heard Elgie and Negan get up and walk to their respective rooms and close the doors. She was completely shut out.

She refused to leave, however. She continued eating. A few minutes later, she heard the doors open again and Negan and Elgie walked into the kitchen. Negan had changed to black pants and his white shirt with the sleeves rolled up.

He smiled a wide smile. “Smells great!”                                                                                        

T’Mollek was incensed and confused. But when she realized she was also shamefully happy to see him and that she would do almost anything to touch him, she had to congratulate him. She thought of the cast iron seasoning process. Negan was both heat and metal to her oil.

Negan and Elgie ate. T’Mollek having already finished hers, merely sat and watched.

“Have you heard from the _Enterprise_?” she asked Negan.

“Not yet.”

“They are late in contacting us. Are Data and Del making any progress on the shuttlecraft communications system?”

“Yep,” he repeated, a little more tensely.

They were speaking around the subject in front of Elgie, but T’Mollek knew that, although not common, it was not completely unheard of for a small Romulan scout ship to destroy a star ship.

“I believe it would be prudent to consider planting winter crops,” she said, testing the waters, expecting him to contradict her.

Not looking up from his plate, he muttered, “I believe you are right.”

This was the exact opposite of what she had wanted to hear.

“ _I_ believe these beans are very delicious in my nose,” said Elgie, who had inexplicably placed a green bean inside each nostril. Negan and T’Mollek considered this for a moment, then shook their heads and chuckled. Negan reached over and pulled them out.

“You are a very silly little girl,” he said lovingly.

They continued to eat as they discussed a plan for the winter weather crops and the best method in which to plant them.

When there was a break in the conversation, Elgie decided to continue the line of conversation from a bit earlier. “I believe you said something about a ‘treat,’” Elgie began casually.

“I believe you had said no thank you to treats,” T’Mollek reminded her.

“That was just a game, to see if I could,” she said, looking at Negan.

“I see,” said T’Mollek, also looking at Negan, who was studying his plate. “I also see that you have not yet finished your green beans.”

“I choose not to finish my green beans.

“What is the rule about dessert?”

“I can eat my dessert after I eat my healthy food,” Elgie grumbled. “But my tummy’s too full for healthy food. There’s only room in my tummy left for just _one little treat_.” She held her thumb and forefinger together, demonstrating the approximate measurement of the room remaining in her tummy.

“How about you leave the treat here and after Elgie finishes those beans, she can have it?” Negan suggested.

“Very well,” T’Mollek said, wondering how long she would be required to stay. She had heard Negan muttering to himself in his office and she was eager to return to her tent to listen to the recording and hear if he had said anything edifying about their predicament.

Negan smiled at her, but his eyes were cold. “We’ll see you tomorrow at six.”

Slowly, T’Mollek stood to go, surprised to be dismissed so abruptly. “Actually, I think I prefer to eat dinner in my own tent tomorrow,” she said, taking a step toward the door.

Firmly but pleasantly, for Elgie’s sake, but his eyes still cold, he repeated, “We’ll see you tomorrow. At six.”

T’Mollek swallowed. “Yes, sir.” She started out the kitchen.

Suddenly flashing his patented beaming grin at Elgie, he said, “Let’s go play with your dolls while T’Mollek cleans up!”

T’Mollek stopped short, startled. She turned on her heel and headed back to the kitchen like an automaton. An extremely irritated automaton.

“Yayyy!” cried the oblivious little girl as they went off to her room to play.

T’Mollek cleaned the kitchen and called out to them, “I’ll see myself out!”

There was no response.

Undeterred, she opened the mini fridge to retrieve a bottle of the well water Negan had not let her serve the previous night. The murkiness in it might have indicated a periodic seepage of contaminant, she thought. Unfortunately, all the bottles were gone. He had said he was saving them for the herb garden. She checked the herbs on the back deck and found that the soil was damp from their recent watering.

She went across the road and took a sample of water from the well itself. It was indeed particularly murky. She took the sample back to her tent, prepared a slide, and looked at it under the microscope.

No trace of asteria or any other unusual contaminant.

She checked the recording from Negan’s office. It consisted mainly of a long string of vulgarities arranged in colorful ways. Between the unintelligible mutterings, she also heard the words “weapons,” “communications,” “ _Enterprise_ ,” and “children.”


	15. A Spider Spinning Daydreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things heat up between Negan and Dr. O'Reilly when she finds herself in a vulnerable position in the laundry room.

Over the next few days, T’Mollek settled into her role as personal chef. During the day, she had little to no contact with Elgie or Negan, both of whom kept themselves hidden away in their house. Negan had grown silent and more often than not, T’Mollek stopped wearing her earpiece during the day. Every evening she checked the day’s recordings but no pertinent information could be gleaned from his mutterings.

One morning, she found a week’s worth of Negan and Elgie’s household laundry in a large basket outside her tent. She carried it across the road to the hospital’s laundry room, but when she pressed the button to start the machine, it didn’t make a sound. She checked the power cord and the power supply. Everything seemed to be in working order except the machine itself.

She paid a visit to the garage to ask Data to take a look at it, but he wasn’t there. She checked the barn and was stunned to find him there, cleaning out the stalls.

“I see he has you doing a variety of work as well,” T’Mollek said.

“There is a great deal to do on a compound this size,” Data said. “All of our hands must remain on the deck.”

“Right,” she agreed. “When you’re finished with this, the laundry machine at the hospital is not working. Would you be able to take a look at it?”

“Certainly, sir,” he said.

“Thank you,” she replied, not at all used to being called that by her superior officer. “Uh, Mr. Data, do you think it’s strange that we haven’t heard from the _Enterprise_ yet? Communications should have eventually gotten through the ionic field, shouldn't they?”

“It would seem so,” he agreed. “However, there are multiple reasons that could account for the lack of communication. They may have been delayed on Starbase 149. They may have been diverted on their way back from the starbase. They may have been destroyed by the Romulan ship that attacked us. They may have taken—”

“Data, what do you think is the most likely scenario?”

“Without additional information, any of the aforementioned scenarios are equally likely.”

“How soon until we should worry?”

He cocked his head at her as if to say, _What, me worry?_

“How soon until we should be _concerned_ ,” she amended.

His eyebrows indicated understanding. “I have been concerned since the crash.”

T’Mollek nodded. “As have I. Thank you, Commander.”

“You are welcome, Doctor.”

She realized now that there had been an embarrassingly emotional reason T’Mollek had been avoiding Data and Del for the past several weeks. She didn’t want her fears confirmed. It had been easier to bury her head in her own work.

Speaking of which, Negan’s dirty underwear needed to be cleaned, and she happened to know that Negan had his own laundry room. She returned to the house and knocked on the door.

Negan answered, looking impatient. “Yes?” he asked.

“The hospital’s laundry machine is in need of repair. Data cannot get to it immediately. I need to use yours.”

“What makes you think I have a laundry machine?” he asked, his eyes impassive.

“Elgie told me you had one in your basement.”

His eyes flashed curious amusement as he scrutinized her with his eyes. “Did she now . . .?”

“She did. As you have mentioned on a number of occasions, it is very important that you and Elgie have clean clothes. Data will attempt to repair the laundry facilities at the hospital when he has completed his tasks as a _farmhand_ —” She put a bit of sarcastic emphasis on the word—“but in the meantime, I should clean these. Will that be a problem?”

Negan briefly considered simply taking the laundry from her and doing it himself, but that would undermine his authority. “‘Course not,” he replied with forced cheerfulness. “C’mon in.”

He pivoted on his heel to allow her passage. She walked in and stood by. He went past her, leading her to the basement door, which was in the kitchen. He stopped at the top of the stairs and let her go down first.

He followed her downstairs, and she set the basket down, surreptitiously looking around. He stood at the foot of the stairs watching her a moment. Then he stepped forward to assist, unable not to take control of the situation.

“The detergent’s on this shelf,” he said, handing her the container. “The machines work pretty much like the ones at the hospital.”

There was a long pause as his hand remained on the container separating them.

“Thank you,” she said.

His face broke into a charming half-smirk and he asked her in a low, laconic voice, “Ya want me to keep ya company?”

_Yes, please._

“No, thank you.”

Giving her a curt but understanding little nod, he took a step back, turned, and headed up the stairs. “Alright. Just call if you need anything.”

T’Mollek ran a load of laundry and then stood there, leaning against the washer, looking around and surveying the room. The space was 12 by 20 feet, and there was a wall to the left of the machine. She felt a vibrating sound behind it. _That must be where the furnace is_ , she thought. She looked to the right. A wide pillar held the ceiling up. She walked around it. The furnace was there. She searched the walls, wondering what was on the other side of the wall to the left and how it was accessed. There was no sign of a window or any underground room from the outside of the house on any side. This room was completely hidden.

After fifteen minutes, the spin cycle kicked in. A few minutes later, the machine stopped. She opened the lid and grabbed an armload of sheets. They seemed to resist her, and she gave a strong tug. The mass of sheets she pulled out were sopping wet—and she was now clutching them to her chest. Frustrated, she dumped the heavy, waterlogged sheets back into the laundry machine.

Soaked to the skin, she went back up the stairs to find Negan and Elgie sitting at the kitchen table, braiding several colored pieces of thick twine together and drinking banana milkshakes. When Elgie saw T’Mollek, she hastily threw the pieces of twine to the floor underneath the table and started slurping her milkshake as if that was all she had ever done in her life.

“Your laundry machine is also malfunctioning,” T’Mollek said, pretending not to have seen the craftwork. “The water is not draining from the laundry after the wash cycle is complete.”

“Spin cycle’s on the fritz,” Negan said as Elgie jumped up from the table with her glass. “You gotta jiggle the lid.”

Simultaneously, Elgie was asking, “T’Mollek, want a drink of my milkshake?” She had forgotten she was trying to distract her from seeing the present she was making her and was just thrilled to share her treat with her friend. In her exuberance, she tripped and spilled the entire contents of the glass on T’Mollek. Now in addition to laundry water, she was covered from chest to knees in light yellow cream.

Negan looked at the mess, looked at her dry expression, threw his head back, and laughed. “Looks like _someone_ needs a change of _clothes_!” He stood up and moved in close to her. Their eyes met for just a second too long. He lowered his voice to a commanding tone. “Don’t move.”

While Elgie offered tearful apologies and attempted to clean her off with towels, Negan went down the hall. He returned with his navy swim trunks and a white t-shirt.

“Here ya go,” he said with a grin. “If you wash that uniform now, it might not stain.”

Without a word, she went back down the stairs and turned the dial back to “Spin.” While the cycle made another attempt, she changed into Negan’s clothes. The familiar trunks were of a loose-fitting cotton, and she tightened the drawstrings. The t-shirt had been worn by him recently and carried his musky scent. She suspected he had chosen that shirt on purpose. She padded around the basement in her bare feet on the cool cement floor, deepening her search for an access point to the area beyond the wall. She estimated based on the location that it was directly beneath his bedroom.

All the more reason to earn an invitation there.

The spin cycle powered down. She heard footsteps descending the stairs, and she hurried back to the machine to stand there nonchalantly. She opened the lid and carefully reached in to pull out a pillow case. She twisted it and wrung quite a bit of water out of it.

“Did you jiggle the lid?” Negan asked.

“Excuse me?” she asked, tossing the pillow case back into the machine

“Ya gotta jiggle the lid or the spin cycle won’t work,” he explained again. “There’s a switch that’s not making a connection. Electronics is beyond me, but jiggling the lid up and down seems to help.”

T’Mollek turned to inspect the washer. She opened the lid. Negan leaned in very close and peered over her shoulder.

“Yeah, see, the basket isn’t spinning. It’s not . . . you know . . . sucking the water out of the laundry. It’s not shooting out that pipe there.” He pointed to the pipe leading to the drain in the floor. His words sounded oddly suggestive and tantalizing.

“I see,” said T’Mollek. “Well then . . . ‘jiggling the lid,’ you say?”

She half-heartedly jiggled the lid side to side.

Negan shook his head. “Up and down,” he drawled. He reached around her shoulders, touching her arms in between his, as he sensuously jiggled the lid. She would never have thought that those words would go so naturally together. “Sensuously jiggled the lid.”

She could feel him bumping into the back of her with the front of him. The thin fabric of the shorts she wore ensured that she felt every part of him. It was completely inappropriate physical contact.

Negan’s voice was quiet in her ear. “Like that.”

Momentarily confused as to whether he meant that she was to jiggle the lid “like that” or whether he was asking her if she liked what she felt pressed up against her, she remained silent.

_Yes._

Still standing close behind her, he closed the lid, leaned (even more inappropriately) against her to switch the washer back to “spin cycle.” It loudly kicked in, this time spinning, and rattling and vibrating.

“Thank you,” T’Mollek said loudly, over the noise, her voice strained.

He took a slight step back away from her body, but he still had her pinned, his arms caging her in, his hands on either side of the machine. She was facing the machine, with his body very nearly pressed against hers. Unmoving, he had taken the power position, forcing her to move and create the physical contact.

She was leaning against the machine, her hands on either side of the lid, waiting for him to move. He did not.

Finally, she backed into him slightly. He didn’t move. She slowly turned around, within his arms, her body brushing against his as she did. He breathed in deeply through his nose but maintained full control.

She faced him, their bodies pressed together, and he was staring her down, still trapping her with his arms. She leaned back to break the contact.

“Excuse me—” she began.

Negan suddenly and unexpectedly lifted her up and placed her on top of the vibrating washer. She gasped, startled, her eyes wide. She instinctively tried to push her way forward off the washer. He countered by aggressively stepping in, putting his strong body in between her legs. She was chest to chest with him. Her hands were behind her, gripping the top of the machine for support. Her entire body vibrated. Her breath caught and she resisted with every bit of strength she possessed not to put her hands all over this man.

He leaned in to her and whispered gruffly, “Looks like the Big Bad finally caught Little Red.”

Her body began to respond in fascinating ways and he was barely touching her. It as if his eyes were reaching into her soul and stimulating every nerve fiber in her body.

“How far d’you think we can go before the machine shuts off?” he purred in her ear.

“How . . . far . . .?”

Without warning, Negan’s large, powerful hand had grasped her by the back of the head, his fingers entangled in her hair, his mouth still touching her ear. He remembered how readily she had responded to this sort of move on the couch not long ago.

She reminded herself that she had, in fact, given silent consent for all of this. As sure as she had killed Dr. Richards and the others, she was responsible for this. What was more, although much smaller in stature, she was sure that she was physically stronger than Negan. She could stop this at any time.

But she wasn’t stopping it. And she wasn’t fighting him.

He put his left hand on the soft fabric that covered the top half of her right thigh. She hesitated and then ever so slightly opened her legs to him. A clear invitation. He stepped forward, and she gripped his waist tightly with her thighs. His hand inched up her bare thigh, their eyes locked. He tilted his head and lifted his eyebrows slightly, silently asking permission.

He was bonded to her, she had given herself to him, yet he still asked permission.

Almost imperceptibly, she lifted her chin in a gesture of affirmation as she opened her legs to him even further. With her approval, he slid his hand upward, resting with his fingertips just beneath the bottom of her shorts.

“Is it true what they say about the insatiability of Romulan women?” he murmured.

She tried to keep her voice under control as her thigh involuntarily quivered beneath his touch. “I . . . wouldn’t know . . . .”

He pulled away from her to get a better look at her eyes, his fingers still entangled in her hair. “I think you _would_ know.”

“I have spent . . . many years learning to gain control over those . . . feelings,” she said with some difficulty.

“And then I come along, huh?”

He moved his hand fully up her bare thigh underneath the cotton shorts. She gasped and briefly considered pressing her hand to his to guide him closer. But the not knowing was more tantalizing.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked suddenly.

_This is a trap._

“According to Commander Riker, you’re President Jaxon Traegar of the former penal colony on Algalon,” she answered carefully. “A philanthropist and humanitarian. You were . . . a teacher before entering politics.”

“Is that all you know about me?” His fingertips slid to the very edge of acceptability.

“Is there more?” T’Mollek gasped innocently.

His voice low and utterly animalistic, he growled, “I'm the man who's gonna make you. . . .” He leaned in and whispered the filthiest things she had ever heard into her left ear. Her eyes clouded over and she nearly collapsed into him. She couldn’t even process his words, but they made her feel rolling explosions all over her body.

He took her by surprise by gently pulling her head to the other side. His beautiful mouth was on her neck, his beard brushing her skin. His fingers were now caressing a certain, little-known anatomical feature exclusive to Romulan women, which T’Mollek happened to possess. Her body bucked against his touch. It was the organ that produced the elusive climax for the Romulan female, and the one that virtually no Romulan man ever took the time to locate.

But Negan was honed in on it and seemed to know exactly how gently to manipulate it. When did he spend time on Romulus and where did he find a Romulan woman to instruct him on this procedure?

He was still whispering filthy nothings into her brain when he abruptly pulled his hand away. He straightened up, looking down at her with confident satisfaction, still in control. “But not yet,” he said sweetly. “Sorry.”

At that moment, as if he had timed it intentionally, laundry water gushed out of the machine’s pipe into the floor drain, releasing the built-up moisture from the laundry.

_Yon quan._

T’Mollek let out a sharp cry of frustrated disappointment just as the washing machine shut off, her voice echoing in the empty basement. The anti-orgasm.

“Are you OK, T’Mollek?” Elgie’s voice called down from the top of the stairs. When there was no answer, she called again, “T’Mollek?” She put a foot on the top step.

“I’m fine, Elgie,” T’Mollek choked casually. “I’ll be right up.”

“Okay!” the little girl said, satisfied, her footsteps padding away from the door.

T’Mollek’s lungs, which had forgotten to breathe for a while, suddenly and involuntarily filled with air.

“If there’s one thing a politician is good at,” Negan said, “it’s spin.”

T’Mollek clumsily tried to scoot off the machine, but Negan’s strong, tall body still blocked her, and all she accomplished was pressing even more closely against him. She could have easily overcome him. In fact, all she wanted to do was overcome him, to overpower him. To make him finish what he’d started.

But instead, she utilized her emotional strength.

“Indeed,” she said in agreement. “May I?”

Grinning down at her, he backed away. He had to pull himself free from her strong legs, which she hadn’t realized until that moment had been gripping him tightly.

“You’re weakening,” he mentioned. “I can feel it.”

He headed for the stairs, his work there finished. Well, not quite finished. He stopped, backed up a few steps, then turned slowly on his heel and leaned in to her ear. “Leave the shorts,” he whispered before laconically returning up the stairs, whistling a jaunty tune.

T’Mollek digested that command for a moment. Then she sat for a moment gathering her composure and then slipped off the laundry machine. Her weak knees buckled, and she dropped to all fours. 

When she was able, she stood shakily, pulled Negan's shorts down, and stepped out of them. They were soaked. She folded them neatly and obediently and placed them on top of the malfunctioning laundry machine. Then she picked up the basket of laundry and carried it upstairs.

“Stay for dinner,” Negan said conversationally as Elgie colored at the kitchen table. “I’m cooking vegetable stew.”

T’Mollek could not meet his eyes. She simply nodded. 


	16. Spies are Forever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Data plays tutor to Elgie. Months of surveillance finally pays off for Dr. O'Reilly.

Late the following morning T’Mollek arrived at Negan’s house per her duty roster and was surprised to see Data already there. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of Elgie, moving small wooden blocks around.

“If you remove these four unit blocks from this tens block,” Data was saying, “how many unit blocks will you have remaining?”

Elgie sighed in boredom. “Eleventy-thirteen thousand infinity and beyond.”

Nonplussed, Data answered, “That is incorrect. There would be six remaining unit blocks. Let us try this another way—”

“T’Mollek!” Elgie cried, suddenly seeing the doctor. She jumped up, leaving Data in her wake. “I have sumpeen for you!” She ran to her room and brought back the colorful braided wristband she and Negan had made the prior evening. It was crafted from several strands of strong twine in a surprisingly intricate braided pattern. The colors complemented one another perfectly. In fact, when she had been a little older than Elgie, she had considered those colors to be her favorites. It was quite lovely.

“Elgie, did you make this for me?” T’Mollek asked, crouching down to the little girl’s level.

Elgie nodded, her lips pressed tightly together with humble pride.

“It’s the most beautiful piece of jewelry I have ever owned,” she said sincerely, placing it ceremoniously on her left wrist. “I am touched beyond measure that you sacrificed your time and your talent to honor me with this most lovely gift.”

Elgie had no idea what to say to this, so she threw her arms around T’Mollek. T’Mollek, a bit surprised by this show of affection, returned the hug.

“All right, you get back to your numbers,” T’Mollek said. “I have work to do. Data?”

“Very well, then,” Data said. “Elgie. I have seven unit blocks, but I wish to increase that number by three. At that point, how many tens blocks would I have?”

“A monkey.”

Data frowned in confusion, tilts his head slightly, trying to compute this. “A monkey is not a number.”

“A monkey has a butt, you know,” Elgie said, suddenly engaged. “And poop comes out of the butt, dest like people. I mean—” She shook her head and waved her hands in front of her face to erase what she just said. “People don’t come out of monkey butts. Dest poop.”

She opened her mouth and took a quick, deep breath to wax on further, but she was interrupted.

“Elgie, Mr. Data is trying to teach you about counting units,” T’Mollek said. “Math is very important in life.”

“Poop is more important, though, in life,” Elgie informed her. “Even when it’s dest monkeys’.”

“Poop is _very_ important,” T’Mollek agreed. “I do not deny that. However, this is not poop discussion time. This is math time. Mr. Data is encouraging you to think with your brain.”

“But math units are too _boring_ for me. I wanna go outside and play. Playing is important. When I was inside last week, you said—” She effected a stoic, disciplined tone that was not inaccurate—“‘Elgie, you have spent far too many hours playing inside. It is important to spend time outdoors, playing. This is how you learn skills like risk-taking and essploration.’”

“My, you do listen to every word, don’t you?”

“I wanna go outside and learn my skills,” Elgie finished, picking up her backpack in one hand and her magnifying insect jar in the other.

“I understand that you want to do what you want to do,” T’Mollek said. “But math is also an important skill.”

“It’s too hard.”

“You cannot always take the easy way out. You are capable of accomplishing a great deal if you give yourself the chance to learn. You must continue to grow and to push yourself. Mr. Data, has life in Starfleet been easy for you?”

“It has not,” Data said, still sitting cross-legged on the floor, his back ramrod straight. “However, I continue to find satisfaction in the challenges I encounter on a daily basis and the varying degrees of success to which I meet each challenge.”

Elgie stared at him. “ _Huh_?”

Data recalculated his previous statement and amended it: “I like to learn.”

“See?” T’Mollek said. “Learning is fun. If you’re not interested in math this morning, perhaps science. Mr. Data is the science officer on the _Enterprise_. Has he taught you about the scientific method?”

“I don’t sink so.”

“Mr. Data? Can you propose a scientific question for Elgie? We will conduct an experiment to test our hypotheses—what we guess is going to happen.”

Data considered this. He picked up a long “tens” block in one hand and a small square “unit” block in his other. The tens block was the equivalent length of ten unit blocks. He stood up.  
  
“Elgie. If I were to drop both the tens block and the unit block from my hands at the exact same time, would the larger, heavier block land first; would the smaller, lighter block land first; or would they both land at the same time?”

Elgie’s eyes darted back and forth between the blocks in his hands. She thought long and hard before answering, “I have no idea.”

“Just take a guess,” T’Mollek prompted. “What is your hypothesis?”

“I guess the tens block will land first because it’s biggest?” Elgie hypothesized. “What do you guess?”

“I believe they will land at the same time.”

“I don’t sink so.”

“We’ll see,” T’Mollek said. “But remember, just because a hypothesis is incorrect does not mean that you are wrong. A hypothesis is only a guess as to how you think the experiment might turn out. Every scientist makes a wrong hypothesis sometimes. Isn’t that right, Mr. Data?”

“That is correct,” Data said. “For example, your hypothesis about the cause of the children’s illness being asteria poisoning was incorrect.”

T’Mollek was reminded again that hero worship can often lead to devastating disappointment. “Let the experiment commence,” she announced.

Data dropped them both and they landed at the same time.

“Your hypopasis was correct!” Elgie announced. “Let’s try another one!”

The three of them went into the kitchen to try experiments involving objects that float versus objects that sink. As T’Mollek followed them in, she heard voices coming from Negan’s office. The sound was faint but it sounded as if he were speaking to at least one other person—and it sounded like a female voice.

Because she had heard very little from Negan’s office over the past three months, T’Mollek had stopped wearing her tiny earpiece receiver. She quickly walked to the front door with the intention of racing to her tent and listening in.

When she opened the front door, she saw Del standing there, his hand raised to knock. He seemed both surprised and not surprised to see her there.

“I was wondering where you’d been spending your time,” he said.

“Are you making any progress on the shuttle crafts’ communication systems?”

“Oh, yes,” he said, smiling in his nervous manner. “It’s been fully operational for several weeks now. Today I am working on the propulsion system.”

This took T’Mollek by surprise. Negan had indicated that the communications system was not yet operational, implying that this was the reason they hadn’t yet heard from the _Enterprise_.

“And no word from the _Enterprise_?”

“No . . . no,” he said, his smile fading to a light grimace of discomfort.

“It seems strange that Jaxon has _you_ working on the shuttle craft while Data cares for Elgie.”

“Why is that,” he asked defensively, “because I’m Berellian?”

T’Mollek was taken aback. “No. I apologize most sincerely for my poor choice of words,” she said. It was a common stereotype that Berellians were terrible engineers. “I only meant that if the propulsion system were really a priority, it would seem that he would want an android working on it as well.”

“He does help!” Del snapped, then caught himself. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me these days.” He rubbed his eyes with his hands.

“Have you been getting enough sleep?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.

Del smiled. “Ah, turning it around on me, are you?”

She gave him a small smile. “Do you need to see Jaxon?”

“If he’s available.”

“He’s in his office.” He followed her down the hall and she knocked on his door, as if she were his executive assistant.

“Come,” his voice came from inside the office.

T’Mollek opened the door. “Del is here to see you.”

Negan nodded and she stepped aside to let Del walk in past her. Negan looked at T’Mollek expectantly and after a brief pause, she closed the door. She knew they were up to something, that they had secrets. She went back to the front door, intent on getting that receiver.

Before she had reached the door, however, Data entered the living room from the kitchen. “My educational responsibilities are complete for the day,” he said. “If you need me, I will be in the garage. Del and I are attempting to repair the shuttlecraft’s propulsion system.”

“Why are you working on the propulsion system?” T’Mollek asked. “We’re not flying it anywhere, are we?”

“That is not for me to decide,” Data said. “It is what Jaxon asked us to do.”

“It seems like a waste of time and resources to me,” she said. “Del and I don’t even have a working shower.”

“If you would like a working shower,” Data said, “All you need do is ask.”

_Was it really that easy?_

“Data,” she said doubtfully. “I would like a working shower.”

“I will ask President Traegar to place it on the duty roster,” he said.

T’Mollek rolled her eyes. “If he’d felt that was a priority over the shuttle repairs, he’d have had that done months—”

“T’Mollek!” Elgie called from the kitchen. “Can you help me clean up this water?”

She sighed, grateful for the recording capability Data had installed in the listening devices she had left in her tent. She entered the kitchen, surveyed the damage, and grabbed a mop out of the pantry. After a few short seconds, Negan and Del exited the office. Negan took two bottles of water from the mini fridge, and he and Del went outside.

***

After the kitchen and living room were thoroughly cleaned and her hours logged, T’Mollek’s next duty for the day was to check in on the children at the hospital. They were alert and capable of drinking water in small amounts. One child even asked for food.

T’Mollek started to feel hopeful again. Perhaps whatever this was, it had finally run its course without her intervention. That was just fine with her.

Her work for the morning complete, she picked some vegetables for lunch and went back to her tent to listen to the recordings from Negan’s office.

***

The first recording was of the conversation T’Mollek had heard through the office when she first arrived.

“We are ready to collect our property as agreed upon,” a stern woman’s voice asked without bothering with greetings or niceties. “ _Including_ whatever is left of the quarry we shot out of the sky."

T’Mollek recognized that the woman was speaking Romulan, although the Universal Translator built into T’Mollek’s communication badge deciphered the language.

“We’re still working on it,” Negan said. “There were some complications.”

“Complications were not part of our arrangement,” she snarled. “If they haven’t been resolved tomorrow when we come for the girl, we will simply destroy what is left.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Negan said with urgency. “The _Enterprise_ returns in a week, and they’ll fix everything. Then you can have the girl _and_ all the rest—all the Starfleet tech and personnel you want.”

So T’Sharr’s suspicions had been confirmed, T’Mollek thought. Negan was negotiating with the Romulans, trading the lives of Elgie and the _Enterprise_ crew—but for what?

Then she realized something. There had been no mention the other children. The Romulan commander did not know they had survived. But how did she know about Elgie?

“You fool!” the Romulan commander scoffed. “We destroyed the _Enterprise_ before it ever left orbit. The rest of our fleet is already seizing Betagon as we speak.”

T’Mollek experienced a physical sensation that was oddly familiar. All was lost. She was thoroughly and literally alone in the universe. Because of the ionic interference that had prohibited communication, Starfleet had no way of knowing she and Data had made it to Algalon alive.

No one was coming to her aid.

Her mind started to work out a plan. Communications were coming through now, at least until the next ion cloud passed over. Even if a distress signal could be sent, it would be intercepted by this Romulan vessel. Betagon was under siege, and even a fully operational shuttle craft could not get them as far as Calagon. They would need something larger. Perhaps the engineers could rig together parts from the _Cristoforetti_ and the _Infinity_ to make a more powerful craft. Or they could find something useful in the capital city.

“Why didn't you tell me this before?” Negan was saying, his voice strained.

“I am told that hope can be a successful motivator,” the Romulan commander said. “But apparently not in your case. Let’s try despair.”

“Don’t take the girl,” Negan said quietly. “She's small and weak. She doesn’t have her parents’ strength.”

“That sounds almost like . . . love?” She laughed. “Paternal love, or—?”

“I just mean she’ll be a disappointment to you,” Negan said. “She won’t serve you well.”

“Oh . . . I don't intend for her to serve me . . . .” she said.

Negan’s voice was hoarse. “What do you mean?”

But the Romulan commander was finished. “Once you have fulfilled your end of our arrangement, you will be transported by our ship to the nearest starbase as promised. We no longer want you. We only want the girl. _Do I make myself clear_?”

“Yes. You do. But without the _Enterprise_ to help, we’ll need more time.”

“You have thirty days. Then we will collect what is ours, and I assure you, _Traegar_ , that all ties between us will be severed.”

The only other sound for several seconds was Negan’s deep, shuddering breath.

T’Mollek felt an overwhelming instinct to protect Elgie. She wondered what the Romulans had in store for the girl—and why.

A few moments later, she heard the door knocking, then Negan’s “Come.” She heard her own voice: “Del is here to see you.” The sound of the door opening and closing. T’Mollek being dismissed.

Then: “Have you reached the _Enterprise_?” Del asked.

“No. Still can’t pick anything up on this thing.”

“Ah,” Del said. “I thought I heard you speaking with someone.”

“Talking to myself. A bad habit, years of living alone. Have you made any progress on the shuttle craft?”

“Yes, actually,” Del said. “I don't know if it'll hold up outside the planet's atmosphere yet, but we’re getting there.”  
  
“Can you show me?”

The sound of Negan pushing his chair away, the opening and closing of the door. And then nothing.

She picked up the second receiver to listen to what they discussed in the garage.

“How’re the weapons systems? Back online?” Negan asked.

“They are,” said Data, “but the craft itself does not yet seem to be sturdy enough to risk flight. Why do you ask?”

“I always like to have a backup plan,” Negan said. “And speaking of . . . come with me.”

“What is it?” Del asked.

“I found a runabout in that big cave near the beach.”

She heard them walk away. And then silence.

***

Negan walked out of the garage and Del and Data followed. He led them across the road south, past the row of tents, through the beach, and into the caves by the bay. They passed by the massive tree that stood tall and proud, casting shade over a large swath of beach.

Hidden in a nearby cavern just off the water was a runabout, over twice the size of either shuttle craft. Del stood in awe of the ship. It was considered a classic.

“What kind of weapons capability does she have,” asked Negan, “and can you get her running?”

“Where did this come from?” asked Del, looking it over from the exterior. “Was this an authorized craft? How long have you known about this?”

It was as if he’d never asked a question in his life and was making up for it now.

“No idea,” said Negan. “I ran across it yesterday when I was trapping squid to harvest ink.”

“It appears to be a Danube-class runabout,” said Data, “but it bears no official markings.”

Del walked alongside it, giving it a good look. “A prototype, perhaps?”

“That would explain the lack of hull number,” Data said.

“It would also explain the manual hatch release,” said Del. He pulled the latch and the door opened for him. “How long would you say this thing has been sitting in this cave?”

  
“Based on the accumulation of dirt particles,” Data said, “I would estimate at least twenty years.”

Del was excited to look inside. “Shall we?”

Data nodded slightly and the three entered the runabout. They inspected everything. The control panels lit up as expected. Del ordered something from the replicator and it appeared. He tasted it and delight registered across his entire body.

“I have to admit,” he said, nearly in tears, “I never thought I’d taste shragish again.” He held the cup to Negan, who sniffed the hot blue liquid and politely declined.

Data was inspecting the engineering areas.

“Whaddya think, Data?” Negan asked. “Will she fly?”

“The fuel cells are nearly depleted,” he said. “However, there is a contingency fuel cell that might allow the runabout to reach as far as Betagon if all went well.”

“How about weapons?”

“That would require further examination and testing,” Data said.

“It’s getting late,” Del said. “I say we get back to camp now and take a closer look at this beauty tomorrow.”

“Very well,” Data agreed.

They returned to the garage, where they cleaned up for the evening. Data bade them good evening, leaving Del and Negan behind.

“How do you feel about the work Dr. O'Reilly is doing?” Del asked.

“Well, she lost her tricorder within hours of arriving, and she killed Doston,” Negan said bluntly. “How do _you_ feel?”

“It does seem strange that she could have lost such an important piece of equipment,” Del said hesitantly. “Do you think it might be possible that Elgie—”

“Elgie said she didn’t take it. She’s not a liar.”

“Yes, I know,” Del conceded. “But I simply cannot believe that, even as young or inexperienced as she is, that Dr. O'Reilly _lost_ the one tool that was crucial to saving the children.”

“Which just proves her incompetence.”

“She doesn't believe the illness is a virus or a bacteria,” Del continued, with uncharacteristic doggedness. “She seems quite certain it’s being caused by a contaminant.”

“We’re all exposed to the same elements here.”

“Well, the rest of us could have some sort of natural immunity that the natives of Algalon don’t have,” Del said. “Perhaps Elgie is not a native of this planet after all? Dr. Hall had suggested Elgie might be of Vulcanoid origin.”

“Her ears are curved. Her blood is red. Dr. Hall wasn’t a xenobiologist. She didn’t know what she was talking about either.”

“She said it’s possible for a Vulcanoid to have copper-based blood if they are of mixed race. And it's possible for them to have curved ears at birth. Or they may have been surgically altered.”

“I’m really not interested in the medical theories of a botanist.”

“Yes, but she said that Elgie's heart and lungs seemed slightly out of place compared to the others,” Del went on a little nervously. “She wasn't able to do a more thorough examination without her tricorder, of course. As you recall, it also vanished soon after we arrived.”

“You’re forgetting that Elgie has lived here all her life, with her parents. I knew them. The three of us brought candy for the school kids that day of the attack. They helped hide us in the school basement and died for their trouble.”

“Yes, of course, but she could have been brought here before you arrived,” Del said, beginning to perspire. “Smuggled here and adopted.”

“She was theirs,” Negan insisted with a hard edge to his voice. “Even as an infant, she looked just like them—especially her mother. She was the perfect combination of them both.”

“Well. All right,” Del’s argument had run its course. He wiped the sweat from his forehead. “It was just something I thought I’d mention. It might hold some key to the mystery.”

“I appreciate your concern and your theory. I presume you’ve shared this with our current medical 'expert'?”

“No, no,” he said. “We haven’t spoken.”

“Well, I’d appreciate if you don’t share your conspiracy theories with her,” Negan said. “I’d prefer you focus your energies on relevant issues like repairing the roundabout.”

“Yes, yes, of course,” Del said. “She should be pleased to learn about your discovery.”

“Yeah, we’re not gonna tell her about that,” he said slowly.

“We’re . . . not?”

“Nope. She thinks working on these things is a waste of time. So what she doesn’t know won’t cause her to question us.”

“Ah. Yes,” Del agreed nervously, mopping his brow.

“Here . . .” Negan picked up the bottles of water he’d set down, handed one to Del, and opened his own, taking a swig. “You’re sweaty as fuck. Looks like you need to keep better hydrated.” He handed him his bottle as well. “Fuckin’ take ‘em both.”


	17. Roll in the Hay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Negan and Dr. O'Reilly experience a literal roll in the hay.

Late the next morning, Negan approached Data, who was repairing the plow in the field, with a question.

“Do you know anything about . . . walipinis?”

“Walipinis? Accessing . . .” He paused as he searched his memory bank. “‘An underground greenhouse utilizing the planet’s temperature to keep vegetation at an appropriate growing temperature during all seasons. Created on Earth in La Paz, Bolivia. Also known as a ‘pit greenhouse,’ the walipini is named after an Aymara Indian word meaning ‘place of warmth.’ Generally rectangular in design, the dimen–”

“Yes, Mr. Data,” Negan interrupted him, as so often happened when Data was trying to edify or demonstrate his understanding. “Could you build one?”

“I believe that I have all the specifications necessary. With the assistance of Del and utilizing the equipment on hand, I believe we could build an efficient walipini within a few days’ time.”

Negan clapped him on the arm. “Great. Please do so.”

Data looked at his arm and then furrowed his brow. “I fail to see the benefit in building an underground greenhouse when the _Enterprise_ is due to return within the week.”

“Well,” said Negan. “What if they don’t return?”

“Why would they not return?”

“Data. Your shuttlecraft was shot out of the sky. For all they know, you’re dead.”

“They would still come back for the wreckage. For the bodies.”

“Right . . . . But what if . . . . Well, what if the Romulans that attacked you . . . attacked the _Enterprise_ as well?”

“That is a possibility. However, the _Enterprise_ is better than equipped to defend itself against attack from the small vessel that fired at our shuttle craft. I see no reason for the _Enterprise_ to have been rendered disabled or destroyed.”

“And yet they didn’t respond when you called them after you landed.”

“No. They did not. But there was subspace interference that had already rendered communication as well as our transporters inoperable. I still find it probable that the _Enterprise_ will return for us at the designated time.”

Negan signed. “OK . . . So are you saying you’re not gonna build us a walipini?” He grinned charmingly, but of course, it had no effect on Data.

“No. I am merely questioning the logic of the decision.”

“Well, the truth is . . . it was T’Mollek’s idea.”

“Indeed,” Data said with a thoughtful nod.

“Yeah.” Negan folded his arms and looked down. “She wanted _me_ to ask, because she didn’t think you’d take her seriously.”

“An astute assumption. She does not appear to understand that the time and resources required to build a walipini could be better spent repairing the shuttle craft.”

“And yet you spent a week repairing and installing solar paneling and several weeks working on the shuttle crafts’ communications and propulsions systems.”

“The solar paneling seemed an appropriate use of resources, in order to have more efficient energy during our scheduled three months on Algalon. The communication and network repairs also seemed a valuable use of time. I will admit that the propulsion system of the shuttles did strike me as an extraneous diversion, but returning the crafts in working order did seem an admirable endeavor. However, by the time we would complete a walipini, the _Enterprise_ would be returning, and nothing would have been planted. We would be abandoning the walipini without ever having used it.”

Negan grinned. “Soooo . . . you’re _not_ gonna build us a walipini?”

Data thought it over a moment. “If you believe it to be a good use of my time, I will build one. My orders are to follow all of your commands.”

This was particularly edifying to Negan—not to mention amusing. “But not T’Mollek’s?”

“I was given . . . ‘leeway’ in that area.”

“Leeway.” His eyebrows went up.

Data nodded.

“All right then,” Negan proclaimed. “Build us a walipini!”

“Yes, sir. I will begin gathering the materials now.” Data turned and walked to the garage.

“Thanks,” Negan said as Data went. Then he walked back to the barn, muttering, “If I never hear the word ‘walipini’ again as long as I live . . . .”

Within the day, Del and Data had begun digging a rectangular hole eight feet deep. Over the next few days, they placed a berm of earth on the side facing the sun and stretched two layers of plastic sheeting over the hole as a roof with a door on one side leading to a set of stairs cut out of the earth to the surface.

Three days later, T’Mollek was assigned to barn duty. It was a hot day, particularly for so late in the season, and as she shoveled hay for the cows, she paused to look at her hands, which were blistered and seeping. While she pondered finishing the job before applying salve to her wounded hands, Negan walked in, seemingly oblivious to her, and removed his shirt.

He was lean but his muscles glistened beautifully. He poured a bottle of water over his head to cool himself off. He slicked his hair back with a hand. It gave him a more menacing look than the tousled way he typically wore it. Then he started lifting large, heavy things easily, and she lost track of life for a moment. She stopped and stared, holding her pitchfork in midair. A cow leaned forward and tried to eat some hay off her pitchfork. Startled, T’Mollek yanked the fork away so it wouldn’t harm the cow. In doing so, she slipped in the hay and fell down into a pile of it.

Negan turned and looked. He hustled over to her and seeing that she was all right, he remarked with his characteristic drawl, “Nothin’ like a roll in the hay in Indian summer.”

“Excuse me?” She felt like she said that a lot.

“Never mind.” Negan held out a hand to help her up.

She reluctantly took it. As her hand met his, she winced slightly. He held her hands and gaped at her damaged palms.

“Whoa! Look at these blisters,” he exclaimed. “Your delicate doctor’s hands aren’t made for this kind of labor, are they? I’m sorry, darlin’, I didn’t realize.”

He was holding her hands so gently—cradling them, really. Her hands trembled slightly.

“They are fine,” she said, remembering to be stoic. “They will heal.”

“You’re gonna have some callouses that won’t go away,” he warned.

“Dr. Crusher can have them easily removed when I return to the _Enterprise_ ,” she said, testing to see his reaction.

“Right,” he said vaguely. “Anyway, let’s get some salve on these hands.”

He gently took her by the hand—for no real reason—to the other side of the barn where a first aid kit sat on a shelf. He pulled out a jar of ointment and rubbed it into her wounds with his thumbs. She was mesmerized by the feeling, surprised his touch could be so gentle. He wrapped her hands in bandages and when that was complete, he continued holding her hands, brushing her wrists lightly with his thumbs and looking down at her.

Their faces were close, holding one another’s gaze, their breath quickening. Her head began to spin and she seemed to lose herself in the moment. She leaned in toward him, but he pulled back. She looked at him in surprise and her brow wrinkled slightly, questioningly.

“Tell me what you want,” he commanded softly.

She looked down and whispered, “You know what I want.”

“Ya gotta ask,” Negan breathed.

This was her last chance to submit to him. Her mission rested on this moment. Even though she knew she would most likely die at the hands of the Romulans in the next thirty days, she felt compelled to finish what she had come here to do. And the most efficient way to do that was to fully submit herself to him, to make him think that he had full control over her.

She looked down. “I cannot.”

“Look me in the eyes and ask for it,” Negan demanded relentlessly.

“I _can’t_.”

He grinned, knowing full well he would have his way. “Ya gotta.”

“Please.”

“Please what?”

“Please . . .”

Negan chuckled, shaking his head with a smirk. He released her hands, turned away from her, and murmured tauntingly, “Ya don’t ask, ya don’t get.”

T’Mollek drew in a shaky breath, leaned forward, and put her hand on his bare shoulder. She stroked his skin with her thumb. He stopped, intrigued but waiting.

“J-Jaxon,” she said haltingly. “Please. Take me.”

He turned, his dark eyebrows raised in surprise, a smirk on his lips.

“ _I need you_ ,” she whispered.

This caught both of them off guard—the pleading, the longing. She felt her body flooding with chemicals, overloading her neural circuitry. She literally swooned and he caught her. This went against everything she wanted, and yet at that moment, he was everything she needed.

He went in for her mouth like an animal. She met his in the same way, her arms reaching up to him, her hands buried in his soft dark hair, raking her fingers through it as though her life depended on it. He bent slightly and scooped her up with his right arm and climbed up the ladder, holding on with his left. She was astounded at his strength.

When he got her to the top, he set her down roughly on the wood floor. She gasped, not from pain but from surprise.

“You’re heavier’n you look,” he said by way of apology.

“You’re stronger than _you_ look,” she answered honestly. He grinned at the backhanded compliment.

Like a wild animal, he crouched on all fours next to her, almost circling her, trying to determine the best angle at which to take her. She sat there, waiting for the kill.

“So, Doc. Ya miss me, huh?”

She nodded helplessly. “Mm-hm.”

Something about Negan brought out a primal instinct that she had never known she had. She knew that he would fight to the death for her. Or fight _her_ to the death. One way or another, she felt that one of those things was going to happen, and soon.

They maintained eye contact, and this time, she let him lean in to her, and she didn’t back away. Then his mouth was on hers. His hands grasped the back of her head and he pulled it back, revealing her pale white neck. He remembered the sounds she had emitted the last time he kissed her there and he wanted to hear that helpless whimper again. But first, he surprised her by swiftly yanking her black uniform trousers down. As she struggled to pull her right boot out of her pant leg, he put his hands on her thighs and spread them apart, releasing her right foot. He knelt between her bare legs as he looked down at her, their eyes cloudy with lust. He roughly kissed her, opening his jaw to envelope her mouth to her chin. He was predatory and possessive like a beast. She moaned as she accepted that she was his.

“Now,” she begged.

“Now _what_ ,” he said roughly.

“I need you . . . On top of me. _Inside_ of me.”

“Now was that so hard to say?” he asked, the sudden sweetness of his voice nearly sending her into climax.

He unbuckled his belt and pulled down his trousers. He body was on hers, and she felt a sharp pressure. She gasped and he backed away.

“No!” she cried, clutching him with her legs and arms.

He grinned, buried his mouth in her neck, and nipped her.

She gasped again, this time with surprise. “Did you just . . . _mark_ me?”

He looked down at her. “Maybe.”

“To what purpose?” she asked logically. “Your only competition for mating rights are an elderly man and an android.”

He shrugged. “I don’t know what you’re into . . .”

She smiled, grabbed him roughly by the hair, pulled his head to one side, and marked him back.

He growled at her and gently placed her back into position to resume consummation when—

“Dzaxon! T’Mollek! Data’s being _mean_!” Elgie was just downstairs, entering the barn.

T’Mollek let out a growl of frustration to rival Worf’s heartiest warrior cry.

“Yeahh,” Negan said in strained agreement, as he hastily fastened his trousers.

They dizzily descended the ladder and Elgie ran to Jaxon. T’Mollek stumbled, aching, groaning, to her tent as quickly as her feet would carry her.

“T’Mollek, come play with Dzaxon and me!”

Ignoring her, and with a guttural moan, T’Mollek ran into her tent and slammed the door.

“Nope,” Negan told the little girl, watching T’Mollek with a grin. “She needs us to leave her alone for a little while.”

At that moment, Negan began to think in earnest about his options for the future. He had some horrible, impossible choices to make. But whatever happened, he would make certain that T’Mollek and Elgie were a part of his future.

Meanwhile, T’Mollek was in her tent, blowing off steam by sparring with her invisible wrestling partner. She had less than thirty days to kill Negan.


	18. Seeds, Lies, and Audiotape

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The disease claims another victim and Negan's lies continue.

Negan hadn’t spoken to T’Mollek since their near-coupling in the barn. He hadn’t assigned her to his house in nearly a week. However, Del and Data had completed the walipini in that time, for which she was grateful. She brought the first bag of seeds to plant but hesitated before going down the steps into the underground structure. Basements were difficult enough for her, but this felt like stepping into her own grave.

She was surprised to see Negan coming toward her. They stood side by side looking at the structure.

“Thank you for the wali—”

He put his hand over her mouth to stop the word. “Don’t mention it,” he said. After a pause he said, “You gonna stand there all day or are you gonna sow some seeds?”

She took a deep breath and descended into the ground to begin planting the winter crops. Data and Negan joined her. Even Elgie helped.

Data handed Elgie a bag of seeds and a small shovel. “Elgie, are you deriving educational benefit from the recordings Doctor O’Reilly provided you?” he asked, by way of making small talk.

T’Mollek went cold. This was the moment she had dreaded since she learned Data would be joining the away team. He had helped her modify the electronic devices she had taken from the Blotorkian ship, ostensibly into educational tools for Elgie and the bedridden children, who were now up and about.

“What recordeens?” Elgie asked.

“T’Mollek asked me to reconfigure a microphone and receiver to play music and educational recordings for you and for the other children while they lay in bed.”

“That right?” Negan asked. “I never heard about that.” He looked at Elgie, who gave him a shrug of ignorance.

“The truth of the matter is,” T’Mollek spoke up, “I no longer have the recordings.”

Negan’s booming laugh rang hollowly in the underground cavern. “You no longer—Are you fu—are you serious? Didja lose ‘em with your tricorder?”

“Perhaps they were lost in the shuttle crash,” Data suggested.

“Yes, perhaps they were,” T’Mollek said offhandedly. “I apologize for having wasted your time. Data, after we complete our planting, could you show me the progress you’ve made on the shuttle craft? I’d like to try contacting the _Enterprise_ again.”

“They will contact us as soon as they are within range,” Data said. “If they have not contacted us, they will not likely respond to our hail.”

Negan grinned. “She’s gettin’ antsy.”

When Data had completed planting his bag of seeds, T’Mollek tossed her remaining seeds into the dirt and beckoned for him to follow her.

Once inside the garage, she checked to make sure Negan hadn’t followed. She closed the door. “The _Enterprise_ is not returning.”

“In fact, they are. President Traegar received a subspace communique from Captain Picard just this morning. They were diverted to Starbase 157 to transport a diplomat to a peace conference. They have been delayed two weeks.”

“He told you this?”

“No. He told Del, who told me.”

“One of them is lying,” she said sharply. “What exactly did Del say to you?”

Data accessed his memory bank. “Del had shared with Jaxon his theory that the _Enterprise_ had been destroyed by the Romulan vessel. Jaxon replied that he had received a subspace communique from Captain Picard—”

“’Just this morning,’ yes,” T’Mollek interrupted impatiently. “And Del believed this convenient tale?”

“Yes. He said, ‘I have learned it is best not to question Jaxon or back him into any corners.’”

T’Mollek perked up at this. “Data. That sounds like he doesn’t believe him, but he is not questioning him out of fear.”

“I did not get that impression.”

“Because you are an expert at picking up on the subtleties of nonverbal cues among humanoids?” she asked sarcastically.

“I am no such expert,” Data admitted. “But nothing Del said gave me cause to believe he did not trust Jaxon.”

“You don’t think it’s strange that he, Del, and Elgie are the only ones here who haven’t gotten sick?”

“It is a medical mystery, but I fail to see it as evidence of deceit.”

“Data,” she said cagily, “I was on the beach recently. There is a runabout hidden there.” Both of these things were true, although there was technically no correlation between them.

“Yes,” he said. “Jaxon found it recently as well. Del and I spent the last week inspecting it. It is low on fuel but appears to be fully operational.”

“That’s strange,” she said. “Why would neither Jaxon nor Del mentioned the runabout _or_ the communique?”

“I do not know,” Data answered simply. “My duty is to follow President Traegar’s orders. Not to question his motivations.”

 _Heroes and gods can only disappoint_ , she thought. But she was now convinced she had been right about two things—Negan was a liar and Del was terrified of him.

***

Del returned to the garage to join Data in his work. After several minutes of debating whether to share T’Mollek’s suspicions, Data decided that honesty was the best policy and that he would need an ally if he needed to relieve her of her command.

“Dr. O’Reilly has expressed suspicion about the veracity of President Traegar’s assertion that he received a communique from the _Enterprise_ this morning.”

“Oh?” Del said, not giving away too much.

“She also conveyed her frustration that she had not been advised that he had found a runabout in the cave.”

“Yes, well . . . I can see where she might have felt a little . . . left out of the loop . . .”

“She attempted to draw a parallel between the _Enterprise_ ’s delay and the fact that you, he, and Elgie have not become ill.”

Del sighed. “Not so fast.” He rolled up his sleeve to reveal a splotchy purple rash on his wrist.

“How long have you had this?” Data asked.

“I woke up with it on my wrist this morning,” he said. “It’s already spread to my shoulders. Probably all over by now.”

“And Dr. O’Reilly is unaware?”

“Yes. She’s got enough to worry about. She can’t do anything for me anyway, and if she knew, she’d just put me to bed.”

“How are you feeling?”

“Quite bad,” he said. “I feel as if I don’t have much time on my feet. I’ve got to get as much done as I can before . . . .”

“I understand. Let us not waste any more time in idle chit-chat.”

They continued their work, but just before the end of the shift, Del fainted. Data carried him to the hospital and set up an IV. He knocked on T’Mollek’s door to let her know the news.

It had taken Dr. Hall and Del some time, but they did both eventually succumb. They were of different species, both with different body chemistries. Perhaps something they had been exposed to on the _Infinity_ had helped give him advanced protection against the illness.

T’Mollek wondered how long it would take for Negan and Elgie to succumb. Would T’Mollek be stranded on this planet with Data? And if this weren’t Tarsen’s, or if it were a new strain, would she, in fact, also eventually contract whatever this was? Not that any of it mattered: the Romulans would soon be there to capture or kill them all.

The only thing T’Mollek knew for certain: she was completely on her own.


End file.
